UC-NRLF 


%*! 


I 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 

GIFT  OF 

GEORGE  MOREY  RICHARDSON. 


Received,  ^August,  1898. 
v  ^Accession  No.  7.J?.y. 7 y        Class  No. 

lfeKJS2^?KSZKSZS2S2S2iZM:^ 


/ 


VILLAGE    PHOTOGRAPHS 


BY 


AUGUSTA   LARNED 


NEW  YORK 
HENRY  HOLT  AND  COMPANY 

1887 


COPYRIGHT,  1887, 

BY 
HENRY  HOLT  &  CO. 


Press  W.  L.   Mershon  &  Co 
Rahway,  N.  J. 


M/HA/ 


NOTE. 


The  sketches  composing  this  volume  first  appeared  in 
the  Evening  Post  of  New  York,  and  were  designed  to 
depict  the  varying  scenes  and  changes  of  nature  and 
some  of  the  aspects  of  country  life. 


CONTENTS. 


iPTER.  PAGE. 

I.  A  GREEN  NEW  YEAR i 

II.  SOME  VILLAGE  CHARACTERS, 9 

III.  PARADISE  FARM  AND  AUNT  DIDO,   ....  16 

IV.  HUGH    THE    DRUID,    ROSE    MADDER    THE    IMPRES 

SIONIST,    28 

V.  RASTUS  THINKS  OF  GETTING  MA'RRIED,         .        .  36 

VI.  THE  WRENS'  NEST, 46 

VII.  A  MORMON    SETTLEMENT.— STEPHEN  LOSES    His 

MONEY, 54 

VIII.  THE  HON.  HIGHFLYER  VISITS  THE  VILLAGE,  .        .  64 

IX.  THE  VILLAGE  CLUBS.— ST.  PATTY  AND  HER  JUBILEE,  73 

X.  THE  POOR-HOUSE  CHILDREN.— OLD  PETER'S  GIRLS,  85 

XI.  THE  VILLAGE  POST-MISTRESS, 94 

XII.  SAYINGS  AND  DOINGS  OF  Miss  CANDACE,        .        .  103 

XIII.  THE  BUSY  BEES, 112 

XIV.  THE  DOCTOR'S  TROUBLE, 121 

XV.  THE  BOY  ALMIRA  ADOPTED, 130 

XVI.  ONE  SPRING  DAY  IN  HUGH'S  LIFE,         .        .        .  139 

XVII.  THE  HELP  QUESTION  AT  ERASER'S,    .        .        .        .149 

XVIII.  THE  DELIGHTFUL  MAJOR 159 

XIX.  A  ROSE-BUD  GARDEN  OF  GIRLS 169 

XX.  THE  COLORED  BROWNS 179 

XXI.  THE  MINISTERS'  GLEBE  AND  HOPE'S  LOVE  STORY,  186 

XXII.  FASCINATING  MRS.  BRIDGENORTH,           .        .        .  198 

XXIII.  A  STAGE-STRUCK  GIRL, 209 

XXIV.  SHIFTLESS  JABEZ, 219 

XXV.  CUPID  AMONG  JUNE  ROSES. — THE  LITTLE  MAIDEN 

SISTERS, 229 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER.  PAGE. 

XXVI.  MRS.  LEGALITY  AT  THE  WILDERNESS  LODGE,          .  238 

XXVII.  THE  "Dies"  BOARDING-HOUSE,      ....  248 

XXVIII.  THE  OLD  SWEETHEART  .......  257 

XXIX.  THE  STORY  OF  JOB  BIRD,         .....  269 

XXX.  THE  OLD  TAVERN  STAND,    ......  280 

XXXI.  ZIP  COON—  A  DOG  STORY,         .....  291 

XXXII.  A  DOMESTIC  TYRANT,  .        .        .        .        .        .301 

XXXIII.  THE  HOLWORTHY  GIRLS,         .....  311 

XXXIV.  THE  MOST  POPULAR  GIRL  IN  THE  VILLAGE,     .        .  321 
XXXV.  THE  MYSTERY  OF  STYLES  GARTH,          .        .        .  332 

XXXVI.  JOHN  DEAN  AND  ORIANA,     ......  343 

XXXVII.  HUGH  GETS  A  LADY  IN  HIS  EYE,     ....  354 

XXXVIII.  A  SPIRITUAL  EXPERIENCE,          .....  363 

XXXIX.  How  BILL  FULLER  WAS  INDEMNIFIED,  ...  374 

XL.  JELLY  CICERO  OLDHAM  FALLS  INTO  ERROR,     .        .  384 

XLI.  STRANGE  DISTURBANCES  AT  STILLWELLP,       .        .  396 

XLII.  BROTHER  GEORGE,         .......  408 

XLI  II.  THE  UNEARNED  INCREMENT,    .....  419 

XLIV.  JOE  ELMORE  AND  BOB  SMARTWEED  AT  HOME  .        .  432 

XLV.  A  BUNDLE  OF  LOVE-LETTERS.          ....  444 

XLVI.  LOOSE   ENDS  AND  DROPPED   STITCHES   OF  VILLAGE 

LIFE,    .........  453 

XLVII.  CHRISTMAS  IN  THE  VILLAGE  ......  466 


VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS, 


CHAPTER   I. 

A     GREEN     NEW     YEAR. 

I^HE  first  snow  flurry  has  sifted  its  white  powder  from 
a  gray  cloud  only  to  be  followed  by  a  burst  of  sun 
light  chasing  the  winter  gloom  from  hill  and  valley  until 
they  glitter  again  in  warm  browns,  gold,  and  blue,  and 
violet.  High  winds  have  whipped  the  trees  naked,  and 
they  must  go  unclad  through  the  cold  season  owing  to 
the  singular  inhumanity  of  nature.  But  in  their  naked 
ness  they  will  contrive  to  protect  the  waxy  leaf-buds  at 
every  point  and  axis  of  their  being.  These  buds  are 
babies  they  dandle  and  sing  to  when  the  wind  blows  and 
the  snow  falls. 

The  village  is  too  small  to  have  a  name  familiar  to 
many,  but  it  stands  well  planted  on  a  small  piece  of  soil 
which  helps  to  hold  the  earth  together.  The  grass  is 
faded,  but  the  evergreens  are  lusty  and  of  a  splendid 
strength.  I  think  I  have  heard  them  shout  on  cold  days 
when  all  the  other  trees  looked  miserable  from  the 
whipping  of  the  wind.  They  were  not  only  born  to 
endure  hardness,  but  to  love  it.  We  talk  of  heart  of  oak, 
but  give  me  the  heart  of  a  pine  or  hemlock  wherewith 
to  defy  misfortune. 

Of  all  the  lovely  tribes  that  so  lately  adorned  our 
woods  and  fields,  we  must  now  content  ourselves  with  a 
handful  of  bitter-sweet,  and  a  few  ivy  leaves,  or  a  branch 


2  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

of  cedar  and  a  cluster  of  the  ground-pine.  Still  the 
swamp  grass  is  pretty,  and  the  stubble  takes  on  a  pale 
gold  like  sunshine,  and  the  clean  brown  fields  are  good 
to  walk  in,  yielding  a  companionship  which  is  very  sweet 
if  a  little  sad. 

The  long  village  street  is  raftered  over  with  the  inter 
laced  branches  of  the  elms,  and  at  either  end  the  arcade 
opens  to  a  pleasant  vista  such  as  an  artist  would  love. 
Eastward  lies  the  old  burying-ground,  with  gently  swell 
ing  hills  behind  it,  and  at  the  western  end  is  a  sharp 
spire  of  Saddleback  Mountain,  and  the  glade  of  a  wild 
brook  it  has  sent  down  into  the  valley. 

The  little  pools  have  acquired  a  crust  of  ice  pellucid 
and  thin  like  a  sheet  of  window  glass,  through  which  one 
can  see  the  roots  of  plants  at  the  bottom.  By-and-by 
the  ice  will  thicken  on  the  pond  to  a  blue  translucency 
and  get  etched  in  fine  lines  as  the  boys  try  the  runners 
of  their  skates.  The  robin  sitting  on  a  stake  in  the 
orchard  fence  feels  his  feathers  blown  aside  showing  the 
beauty  of  the  pale  red-breast,  while  the  clinging  pink 
toes  look  half  frozen.  The  clouds  look  cold  with  dark 
scuds  moving  fiercely,  still  letting  down  sudden  gleams 
of  splendor,  until  at  sunset  they  are  blown  all  away. 
The  heavens  then  are  open  and  serene,  with  a  fervid 
glow  in  the  west,  against  which  every  object  looks  black. 
The  earth  is  a  charcoal  sketch,  lying  banked *up  against 
that  great  western  blaze,  and  here  and  there  a  mellow 
lamp  throws  out  its  ray  from  some  low  window. 

The  village  houses  look  lower  and  smaller  than  they 
did  in  the  warm  days,  as  if  they  had  shrunk  inwardly  and 
had  gathered  themselves  up  to  resist  the  winter  cold. 
The  front  doors  are  rather  forbidding  now,  whereas  they 
used  to  stand  wide  open.  You  must  seek  the  back  way 
if  you  would  find  the  housewife  and  the  stove.  Still 
every  house  feels  the  dignity  of  its  parlor,  if  it  is  cold  and 
cheerless.  Many  of  the  houses  are  well  banked  with 


THE   SHOEMAKER.  3 

tanbark,  and  make  one  think  of  beaver  dams  and  rabbit 
burrows.  Man's  habitation  in  winter  is  only  an  improve 
ment  on  the  fox's  hole.  He  hibernates  like  the  bear, 
gradually  withdrawing  his  interest  from  the  outer  world 
as  the  cold  advances,  and  concentrating  it  on  the  fireside, 
the  cellar,  the  cattle-shed,  and  the  barn.  It  is  only  in 
cities  where  an  artificial  heat  is  made  by  stone  and  brick 
walls  and  the  united  breath  of  a  great  population  that 
people  do  not  go  into  the  winter  drowse. 

Now  the  woodshed  begins  to  be  a  matter  of  great 
importance.  The  village  "  forehanded  "  man  is  known 
by  the  neatness  of  his  piles  of  split  hickory  heaped  up  in 
the  sacred  repository  of  fuel.  But  coal  is  used  in  many 
houses,  and  the  sound  of  the  grimy  shoveler  is  heard  as 
the  winter  store  goes  into  cellar  and  bin.  The  good 
little  maiden  sisters  in  their  birds'-nest  cottage  where  the 
flaming  Virginia  creeper  has  lost  all  its  leaves,  have  been' 
made  very  happy  by  two  loads  of  wood,  which  a  kind- 
hearted  farmer  drew  for  them,  and  the  village  lads  have 
split  it  into  lengths  for  the  tiny  stove  and  piled  it  close 
within  the  sisters'  reach,  and  they  are  as  snug  for  the 
winter  as  two  dormice.  Their  wise  cat  looks  out  of  the 
bright  little  window,  and  follows  them  to  church  still, 
although  she  loves  not  wet  or  frosty  ways. 

The  shoemaker  hugs  his  stove,  and  now  works  in  an 
overheated  atmosphere,  such  as  all  shoemakers  seem  to 
delight  in.  He  is  a  crooked  old  man,  with  head  and 
beard  as  white  as  snow,  and  a  fine  pale  skin  and  delicate 
features,  for  too  much  indoor  work  has  spoiled  his  ruddy 
complexion.  He  knows  almost  every  pair  of  shoes  in 
the  village,  for  his  cure  of  soles  is  a  large  one.  A  curious 
heap  of  foot-casings  lies  in  one  corner  of  his  shop. 
They  all  have  a  character  of  their  own,  from  the  "  stub 
bed  "  copper  toes  of  Widow  Blair's  son  to  Farmer  Grime's 
great  square-soled  boots.  There  are  women's  shoes, 
some  slender  and  worn  discreetly  on  the  side,  some  coarse 


4  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

and  run  down  at  the  heel,  some  of  dainty  kid,  "  store- 
kept,"  for  which  the  old  man  has  supreme  contempt. 
The  lasts  upon  the  shelf  are  all  ticketed  :  "  Old  Lady 
Holt."  Yes,  he  has  made  for  her  these  past  thirty  years. 
Young  "  Widow  Holt,"  the  son's  wife,  came  from  the  city, 
and  has  "  notions."  How  he  has  stood  before  that  young 
woman  and  lectured  her  in  his  slow  way  on  the  wicked 
ness  of  French  heels  !  A  book  lies  open  turned  down 
on  the  bench,  and  there  are  moments  when  the  old  man 
stops  sewing  John  Dean's  "  Oxford  tie  "  and  takes  it  up, 
adjusting  the  spectacles  on  his  nose  and  leaning  forward 
with  his  chin  protruding.  It  is  not  the  Bible.  The  old 
man  seldom  reads  that  now.  It  is  a  book  of  science, 
treating  of  the  evolution  of  the  human  race.  Often  the 
young  parson  comes  in  and  sits  beside  him  there  on  the 
bench,  and  the  two  hold  weighty  arguments  together  of 
righteousness,  temperance,  and  judgment  to  come,  but 
the  old  man  is  not  convinced.  On  Sunday  the  shoe 
maker  goes  not  to  church.  All  day  he  is  deep  in  science 
and  philosophy,  while  his  old  wife  trudges  off  alone  to  the 
meeting,  and,  coming  home  again,  says,  "  Oh,  father,  if 
you  only  could  have  heard  that  sermon  !  "  But  the  shoe 
maker  laughs,  with  a  slight  touch  of  contempt,  at  the 
idea  that  the  young  minister  can  teach  him  any  thing. 
He  may  come  and  learn  of  him,  if  he  will,  sitting  on  the 
workman's  bench,  but  the  old  man  will  not  sit  in  the  pew 
.to  return  the  compliment.  The  neighbors  think,  accord 
ing  to  the  eternal  fitness  of  things,  this  obstinate,  con 
ceited  old  man  should  not  be  happy,  but  I  am  fain  to 
confess  that  he  is,  as  he  sings  to  his  lapstone,  in  a  des 
perately  cracked  voice,  those  old  psalm  tunes  he  learned 
at  his  mother's  knee  ;  not  from  pious  fervor  does  the  old 
man  sing  them,  but  because  these  have  stuck  to  his 
memory  like  burrs,  and  he  knows  no  others. 

Not  far  from  the  low  shoemaker's  shop,  where  the 
smoke  is  pouring  in  a  black  stream  from  the  stove-pipe 


THE    VILLAGE  DOCTOR.  5 

which  crowns  the  chimney,  is  the  doctor's  office,  with  his 
house  adjoining.  A  square,  plain  house  it  is,  solid  and 
home-looking,  with  a  great  comfortable  garden  at  the 
back  filled  with  every  variety  of  vegetables,  interspersed 
in  the  old-fashioned  way  with  such  common  and  hardy 
flowers  as  bloom  with  little  care.  Hollyhocks,  sun 
flowers,  larkspurs,  marigolds,  tiger  lilies,  bachelor  buttons, 
and  clove  pinks  grow  in  pleasant  profusion  along  the 
borders  in  summer  time,  but  now  the  garden  is  a  broken 
and  withered  waste.  The  little  drug-shop  stands  next  to 
the  house,  and  is  the  doctor's  office.  The  green  curtain 
is  drawn,  showing  the  good  doctor  is  at  home  engaged 
with  a  stray  patient,  who  has  come  in  to  talk  about 
"  rheumaticks,"  the  common  village  complaint.  The  old 
white  horse  and  much-bespattered  chaise,  still  uncleaned 
from  his  last  round  of  country  visits,  stands  in  the  stable 
ready  to  be  "  tackled  "  and  put  in  motion  on  short  notice. 
Small  peace  and  quiet  has  this  rough,  wise,  humorous 
country  doctor,  with  his  gray  tousled  head,  his  shaggy 
eye-brows  lowering  over  the  kindest  eyes,  and  his  blunt 
speech  giving  forth  nuggets  of  sarcastic  wisdom  for  the 
benefit  of  his  neighbors.  Blunt  he  indeed  is,  and  not  too 
choice  in  his  language  when  awakened  from  his  first  nap 
after  a  heavy  day's  work  by  a  call  to  go  three  miles 
through  the  dark  and  cold  over  miry  roads,  perhaps 
through  rain  and  snow,  to  some  hysterical  woman. 

But  who  could  guess  of  the  deep  true  vein  of  poetry  in 
that  rough  bit  of  human  nature  !  Often  as  he  bowls 
along  on  these  errands  at  night,  gently  touching  up  his 
old  nag,  who  has  served  him  faithfully  these  many  years, 
he  repeats  aloud  long  passages  from  Shakespeare's  plays, 
or  verses  from  the  book  of  Job,  his  two  favorite  poets. 
He  half  shouts  out  the  lines  sometimes  as  he  looks  up  at 
the  bright  stars  through  the  naked  tree  branches,  or  sets 
the  music  of  those  immortal  bards  to  the  great  sad  sough 
of  the  wind  in  pine  branches.  So  he  splashes  and  rum- 


6  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

bles  away  on  his  visit  of  mercy,  beating  his  breast  with  his 
disengaged  arm  to  keep  off  the  cold,  and  raising  his  voice 
in  the  highest  flights  of  poetry  to  warm  his  soul.  How 
much  that  old  man  knows  of  human  weakness,  human 
vanity,  human  depravity  !  How  much  he  knows  of  the 
sin  and  sorrow  which  have  entered  into  so  many  of  the 
gray,  lonely  farm-houses  scattered  over  the  hills  and 
through  the  valleys  !  How  often  he  has  acted  the  con 
soler  and  friend  with  tears  of  sympathy  filling  those 
kindly  eyes  !  How  often  he  has  shown  himself  the  stern 
reprover  of  vice,  even  to  using  his  stick  upon  some  de 
linquent  youth  who  was  ushered  into  the  world  through 
his  skill,  and  has  lived  to  disgrace  the  mother  who  bore 
him  !  I  am  fain  to  confess  the  testy  doctor  has  appeared 
more  than  once  in  court  to  answer  for  such  breaches  of 
the  peace,  but  a  good  case  has  always  been  made  out  for 
him  even  when  he  has  been  forced  to  pay  a  small  fine. 
A  terror  to  evil-doers,  to  profligate,  idle,  useless  peo 
ple  is  the  old  doctor.  And  have  peace,  and  love,  and 
joy  always  abode  in  his  dwelling  ?  Alas,  no.  He  had 
one  fair  daughter,  a  wild  willful  girl  who  married 
against  his  wishes  and  is  lying  now  in  her  grave.  I 
hear  her  child,  a  flaxen-haired  girl  of  fourteen,  just 
touching  the  keys  of  the  old  piano  in  the  parlor,  where 
her  mother  used  to  play  and  sing  in  a  heavenly  sweet 
voice.  The  child  has  brought  a  great  compensation  to 
the  doctor  and  his  patient,  pale-faced  wife.  She  has 
reconciled  the  old  man  to  the  world,  for  he  was  once 
cynical  and  hard,  all  gone  wrong  with  bitterness  of  spirit. 
Now  he  goes  and  sits  under  the  preaching  of  the  young 
parson,  his  grandchild's  hand  in  his,  and  says  softly 
under  his  breath,  "  God  be  merciful  to  me  a  sinner." 

That  child  of  his  loves  the  wild  flowers,  and  the  birds, 
and  the  clouds,  and  every  sight  and  form  of  nature.  So 
in  the  bleak  weather  he  takes  her,  well  wrapped  up,  ori 
those  long  drives  to  lonely  places  in  the  hills.  There 


SADDLEBACK.  7 

they  go  down  the  road  under  the  big  elms,  across  the 
bridge  by  the  mill,  where  the  ruby-colored  water  is  still 
foaming  over  the  great  idle  wheel.  If  the  north  wind 
still  continues  to  send  forth  its  blasts,  the  wrinkled, 
opaque  mirror  of  the  pond  will  grow  smooth  as  glass, 
and  the  wheel  will  adorn  itself  with  thousands  of  jagged 
icicles  and  much  fantastic  lace-work  in  crystal  pendants. 
The  boys  and  girls  of  yonder  school  will  soon  be  skating 
and  sliding,  and  sprawling  like  frogs  all  over  the  pretty 
place  where  geese  and  ducks  paddled  in  summer  time, 
while  they  reared  their  broods  under  the  pollards.  The 
grists  are  almost  ground  for  this  year.  They  have  made 
Christmas  bread  and  pies  and  cake.  The  earth  hath 
yielded  her  generous  increase.  Now  she  girds  herself  to 
endure  the  cold.  Now  she  lies  patient  under  the  flail  of 
the  blast  and  waits  for  the  chastening  of  the  snow. 

The  road  mounts  and  mounts  from  hill  to  hill,  as  if, 
like  the  tower  of  Babel,  it  would  build  itself  into  heaven. 
And  on  the  right  grows  the  vision  of  Saddleback,  a  long 
mountain  with  a  hump  covered  all  over  with  a  thick  shag 
of  forest.  Many  little  brooks  come  down  from  Saddle 
back  and  run  through  the  lowlands  with  refreshing  cool 
ness  and  the  earth  gurgle  of  laughter.  It  is  the  office  of 
old  Saddleback  to  offer  a  cup  of  cool  water  in  the  name 
of  his  Creator.  He  is  our  barometer  and  our  ther 
mometer.  When  the  clouds  gather  in  a  certain  way  on 
Saddleback  it  always  rains.  When  he  grows  dim  and 
ghostly  and  withdraws  into  his  cloudy  tent  and  shuts  the 
door,  it  is  a  certain  sign  of  heat.  I  wonder  the  people 
out  on  the  prairies  do  not  build  themselves  mountains  as 
landmarks  and  objects  of  affection.  A  mountain  need 
not  be  very  high  nor  very  beautiful  to  be  so  intimately 
inwoven  with  life  that  one  would  miss  it  like  a  household 
companion.  It  is  a  good  thing  to  tie  up  to.  It  renders 
the  planet  stable.  It  accents  the  lowlands  and  gives 
them  emphasis. 


8  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

The  old  doctor  dearly  loves  Saddleback.  He  has 
wandered  all  over  it  with  his  grandchild  in  pursuit  of 
nuts,  and  ferns,  and  mosses,  and  autumn  leaves  ;  its  top 
is  clothed  with  pines,  and  a  small  spring  gushes  out  near 
the  summit  from  under  the  shelter  of  a  great  gray 
bowlder,  all  embroidered  with  golden  moss  and  little 
evergreen  ferns,  and  in  spring  with  wild  flowers.  Now 
there  is  nothing  under  foot  but  the  red  pine  needles,  and 
overhead  a  cloud  of  dark  foliage  supported  by  columnar 
stems.  These  serried  ranks  make  a  fine  contrast  on 
bright  mornings  to  the  living  blue  of  the  sky.  The  mount 
ain  gathers  a  deep  cerulean,  and  the  purple  tree-boughs 
work  themselves  out  in  far  vistas  with  exquisite  intricacy. 
The  doctor  is  quoting  poetry  aloud  as  he  gently  strokes 
his  old  nag  with  the  tingling  end  of  his  whip,  and  the 
solid  satisfaction  of  a  day  like  this  beams  from  his  eyes 
and  irradiates  his  rugged  countenance.  It  is  a  good 
open  mild  day  the  first  of  the  New  Year. 


CHAPTER  II. 

SOME    VILLAGE    CHARACTERS. 

THE  village  has  no  manufacturing  interests.  It  is  a 
mere  ganglion  of  inhabitants  and  houses  knotted 
together,  why  or  wherefore  one  can  hardly  tell.  Nature 
holds  the  little  place  in  its  snug  hollow  like  a  bird's  nest, 
as  if  it  loved  it,  as  it  never  can  love  a  smoke-begrimed 
neighborhood,  or  one  resounding  with  the  discordant 
noises  of  much  industry.  It  is  pure  and  spotless  these 
winter  days,  with  the  elm  trunks  and  boughs  making 
delicate  tracery  on  the  snow,  and  the  sunlight  glittering 
on  the  clean  window-panes  in  old  houses.  The  snow  has 
not  destroyed  the  charm  of  little  winding  footpaths  over 
hills  and  through  bits  of  evergreen  coppice  and  oak 
groves,  where  the  leaves  still  hang,  and  rattle  in  the 
winter  wind  as  if  made  of  stiff  paper.  Everywhere  peeps 
out  the  still,  white  world  to  the  blue  of  the  sky,  and  the 
warm  gray  of  rocks,  and  living  green  of  mosses,  with  the 
endless  poem  of  tree  trunks,  and  boughs  spotted  with 
white  bits  of  lichen,  and  colored  variously  for  just  this 
season  of  the  year. 

The  famous  village  ramble  is  Burying-Ground  Walk 
leading  to  the  old  graveyard,  with  its  new  smart  portion 
called  the  cemetery — for  even  the  smallest  country  places 
have  advanced  of  late  years  in  mortuary  architecture,  and 
the  idea  of  what  a  burial  place  should  be.  This  path  is 
the  favorite  in  summer,  and  it  is  very  beautiful  in  the 
cold  season,  owing  to  the  great  number  of  cedars,  spruces, 
and  hemlocks,  that  for  a  mile  and  a  half  line  it  with  their 
warm  fur,  while  the  vista  opens  to  the  slope  of  Saddle- 


io  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

back,  and  the  old  red  farm-houses  corne  so  near  in  view, 
that  you  can  almost  shake  hands  with  the  inhabitants. 
It  is  skirted  on  one  side  by  a  noisy  brawling  trout-brook, 
that  runs  like  a  perpetual  life  current  out  of  the  breast  of 
Saddleback,  and  gurgles  under  the  ice  of  early  winter, 
making  a  choice  music  around  its  big  stones.  The  fields 
lie  in  peace  just  beyond,  their  russet  brownness  showing 
through  the  glaze  of  ice  or  where  the  snow  has  worn 
away  in  patches.  This  rustic  aspect  is  delightful  around 
the  graves  of  the  dead.  It  still  holds  them  in  fealty  to 
the  soil.  The  sights  and  sounds  they  knew  best  when  in 
the  world  are  near  at  hand.  The  plowman  whistles  to 
his  team,  cows  low  in  the  pasture,  and  idle,  truant  boys 
angle  along  the  stream  in  closest  neighborhood  to  that 
silent  village  which  is  bound  by  so  many  invisible  fibres 
to  the  homes  of  the  living.  The  brook  is  lined  with 
violets  and  anemones  in  April,  and  in  June  the  air  is 
loaded  with  the  scent  of  new-mown  hay.  In  autumn 
asters  and  golden-rod  make  a  splendid  carpet  under  the 
trees,  and  in  certain  select  spots  the  fringed  gentian 
opens  its  blue  eyes  very  late  in  the  year. 

This  winding  path  up  a  piece  of  gently-rising  ground 
to  Burying-Ground  Hill  has  been  the  scene  of  more 
marriage  proposals  than  any  other  place  in  the  village. 
An  amusing  story  is  told  of  a  village  maiden  who  married 
and  went  away  to  live  in  that  indefinite  region  known  as 
"out  West."  Years  later,  when  the  husband  died,  she 
brought  his  remains  back  to  the  old  home,  and  buried 
him  in  the  family  plot  in  the  graveyard.  She  could  not 
tear  herself  away  from  the  sacred  spot,  and  again  took 
up  her  abode  in  the  village,  and  spent  much  time  in 
visiting  and  laying  fresh  flowers  on  the  grave.  A  year 
or  two  earlier  an  afflicted  widower  had  brought  the 
"  casket "  of  his  wife  back  to  her  native  town,  and  had 
laid  her  not  far  from  where  the  husband  was  afterward 
put  to  rest.  This  poor  man  constantly  haunted  Burying- 


BURYING-GROUND    WALK.  n 

Ground  Walk  to  muse  on  the  departed,  and,  as  chance 
would  have  it,  one  golden  autumn  day  he  met  the  widow 
in  her  weeds,  which,  by  the  way,  were  very  becoming. 
The  village  gossips  say  the  match  was  made  that  after 
noon — struck  up  in  a  hurry  through  sympathy  and  fellow 
feeling.  But  doubtless  several  interviews  did  take  place 
in  the  "  walk  "  or  in  contiguous  parts  among  the  tomb 
stones  before  matters  were  settled.  Now  the  happy  pair 
dwell  in  the  village  and  are  sometimes  seen  going  hand 
in  hand,  with  an  artless  babes-in-the-wood  expression,  to 
visit  the  resting  places  of  their  former  partners.  As  they 
have  a  leaning  toward  spiritism,  it  is  believed  they  look 
upon  the  departed  as  guardian  angels  who  view  their 
present  felicity  with  extreme  satisfaction. 

Every  week,  summer  and  winter,  rain  or  shine,  Miss 
Milly,  the  village  milliner,  walks  briskly  along  the  burying- 
ground  path  to  the  old  part  of  the  graveyard  where  the 
head-stones  are  decrepit  and  mossy,  and  a  little  cluster 
of  pine  trees  watches  over  the  country  from  the  highest 
part  of  the  hill.  Miss  Milly  is  brisk  and  trim  and 
neat ;  the  print  of  her  shoe  on  the  snow  seems  a 
work  of  art.  Her  father  was  once  thought  to  be  the 
genius  of  the  village,  a  young  man  of  brightest  promise, 
but  he  turned  out  a  spendthrift  and  profligate,  and  lies 
now  buried  in  the  graveyard.  In  spite  of  his  squan 
dered  life,  his  only  daughter  weeps  over  him,  idealizes 
him,  and  adores  his  memory  until  the  neighbors,  who 
think  Miss  Milly  a  bit  of  a  genius  herself,  are  half  pro 
voked.  In  the  snowiest  days  she  will  go  wading  to  the 
hill-top  to  leave  some  green  token  on  her  father's  grave, 
if  nothing  more,  a  few  twigs  of  arbor  vitse  with  a  cluster 
of  holly  berries  from  the  squire's  garden.  The  earliest 
wild  flowers  in  spring  go  up  there,  and  the  very  last 
gentians  and  colored  leaves  and  golden  rod.  If  the  path 
is  not  cut  to  the  hill,  Milly  opens  it  herself,  or  hires  Jake 
Small  to  do  the  work  for  her. 


12  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

At  home  she  lives  alone  (in  the  little  stone  house  that 
was  once  a  lawyer's  office,  and  has  been  enlarged  to  suit 
her  needs),  unless  some  neat-handed  apprentice  should 
find  a  place  by  her  hearth,  with  the  understanding  that 
she  is  to  do  "  chores  "  in  return  for  instruction  in  the 
mysteries  of  millinery.  Milly's  work-room  is  so  peculiar 
there  is  probably  not  another  like  it  anywhere.  It  has  a 
case  of  books,  a  cabinet  of  old  family  china,  and  the 
portraits  of  her  ancestors— the  wreckage  which  she 
managed  to  preserve  when  the  family  fortunes  went 
down.  Milly  read  Latin  and  Greek  a  little  with  her 
father  when  she  was  young.  Her  school-books  are  in 
the  case,  and  a  manuscript  volume  of  her  father's  poems. 
Spinoza  and  Plato  are  Milly's  idols,  but  she  reads  them 
now  in  translations.  The  young  parson  sometimes  comes 
in  and  takes  a  cup  of  tea  with  her,  and  they  talk  learned 
talk,  so  the  village  folk  say,  who  have  the  greatest  respect 
for  the  milliner's  attainments,  though,  in  fact,  they  do  not 
go  very  far.  Her  secret  lies  in  knowing  one  or  two 
books  by  heart.  Are  you  surprised  that  one  small  village 
can  furnish  a  shoemaker  who  reads  Huxley  and  Spencer 
and  a  milliner  who  knows  Plato  ?  Such  people  nowadays 
are  only  found  in  corners.  There  is  no  leisure  for  these 
things  among  the  masses  in  great  cities,  but  certain 
people  in  the  village  do  still  find  time  to  hive  up  sweet 
ness. 

Milly  chose  to  be  a  milliner  when  she  might  have 
taught^school,  and  the  village  folk  have  never  done  won 
dering  why.  But  a  bleak  school-room  gave  too  little 
scope  for  individual  expression.  The  learned  side  in 
Milly  is  not  her  broadest.  She  is  a  human  creature,  a 
woman  to  the  tips  of  her  fingers.  Look  at  the  little  shop, 
adorned  as  a  parlor  with  etchings  and  small  oil  sketches 
upon  the  wall  and  bits  of  embroidery,  such  as  a  woman 
loves,  arranged  with  an  accurate  eye  to  color  harmonies. 
The  bonnets  are  only  a  part  of  the  decoration, 


THE    VILLAGE   MILLIXER.  13 

The  little  milliner  says  she  is  fond  of  folks.  She  looks 
out  and  sees  things  in  the  turn  of  an  eye-lash.  In  every 
thing  except  about  "  poor  papa,"  she  is  careful  of  over 
statement,  and  this  makes  her  pungent  little  flavoring  of 
dry  wit  very  telling.  She  is  pleasant  to  the  eye,  arid  yet 
not  young,  and  so  plain  that  every  body  wonders  where 
her  "  knack  "  is. 

The  judge  or  "square,"  as  he  is  commonly  called, 
extends  his  gracious  patronage  to  Miss  Milly  or  Melissa, 
the  village  milliner.  It  is  a  rule  at  the  great  house  that 
Miss  Milly  is  always  to  be  invited  to  the  Thanksgiving 
and  Christmas  dinner.  When  political  dignitaries  or 
literary  lights  come  from  a  distance  Milly  is  overlooked. 
But  these  are  not  really  the  nice  occasions,  like  the  cozy 
home  meals,  when  the  judge  unbends  and  laughs  at 
Melissa's  dry  little  speeches,  of  a  subacid  quality,  and 
she  on  her  part  laughs  inwardly  at  his  pretensions  and 
corrects  his  Latin.  She  has  remembered  enough  for 
that.  But  she  forgives  him  in  her  heart,  for  he  recalls 
old  stories  of  her  father's  college  life  when  they  were 
"chums,"  and  speaks  gently,  very  gently,  of  the  dead. 

No  one  knows  exactly  how  the  village  came  to  be,  but 
the  judge  thinks  it  was  made  for  him.  When  he  walks 
abroad  he  has  the  air  of  owning  the  place.  He  and  the 
clergyman  and  a  few  others  habitually  wear  store  clothes, 
which  means  a  certain  luster  and  polish  of  attire  to  which 
the  ordinary  farmer  and  mechanic  can  not  attain  except 
on  Sunday.  The  judge  would  like  to  be  a  village  auto 
crat,  but  his  neighbors  utterly  repudiate  his  pretensions. 
"  It's  a  free  kentry,"  says  Jake  Small,  "  and  I  guess 
human  motives  is  pretty  well  mixed.  The  jedge  may 
think  he's  clean  public-sperited  all  through,  but  I  guess 
there's  some  selfishness  at  the  bottom." 

Jake  can  afford  to  criticise  the  judge.  He  is  a  man  of 
property  as  solid  as  a  rock.  Jake  owns  a  little  queer 
ridiculous  gore  of  land  that  lies  in  just  between  two  of 


14  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

the  judge's  best  fields,  and  cuts  off  the  right  of  way  to  a 
handsome  pasture.  The  village  magnate  is  therefore 
obliged  to  drive  his  cows  half  a  mile  round.  He  has 
offered  Jake  a  large  price  for  his  scrap  of  soil,  and  has 
even  condescended  to  call  him  Mr.  Small  ;  but  the  old 
man  holds  on  to  his  ancestral  half-acre  with  the  grim 
clutch  of  fate.  If  he  parted  with  that  precious  gore  of 
land,  all  his  importance  in  the  village  would  ooze  away. 
He  would  be  only  a  shiftless  old  codger,  without  power 
to  put  in  his  word  anywhere,  or  to  make  himself  felt  in 
discussions  about  national  politics.  The  little  piece  of 
land  came  to  him  from  his  grandfather — through  a  dis 
puted  title.  Jake  would  rather  go  on  one  poor  meal  a 
day  than  think  of  parting  with  this  miserable  strip  of  soil. 
When  the  weather  is  not  good  for  fishing,  or  blackberry- 
ing,  or  going  to  camp-meetin'  (Jake  is  very  pious),  he 
often  digs  and  potters  about  a  little  in  the  gore.  It  puts 
fat  on  his  bones  to  know  that  the  "  jedge  "  is  looking  on 
from  his  back  window  and  metaphorically  gritting  his 
teeth. 

Several  times  Jake  has  impounded  the  judge's  cattle 
for  trespass.  What  makes  the  situation  extremely  awk 
ward  is  the  fact  that  a  stream  of  living  water,  Willow 
Brook,  flows  through  one  of  the  judge's  pastures,  while 
the  other  is  quite  arid.  In  a  dry  time  there  is  always 
trouble,  the  battle  being  waged  across  the  gore  with  ter 
rible  pertinacity  on  both  sides.  Jake's  part  of  the  fence 
is  a  ramshackle,  ruinous  affair,  and  the  judge  declares 
that  most  of  the  boards  which  compose  it  were  stolen 
from  his  premises,  but  he  never  has  been  able  to  bring 
proof  of  the  fact,  for  the  neighbors  refuse  to  testify 
against  Jake. 

Jake  lives  in  a  wretched  old  tenement  on  the  outskirts 
of  the  village,  that  was  moved  off  the  Widow  Grimes's 
place,  and  doomed  to  destruction.  But  Jake  coaxed  the 
widow  to  let  him  have  it  in  return  for  gathering  her  gar- 


JAKE   SMALLS  ABODE.  15 

den  "  sass  "  and  splitting  her  winter's  wood.  Then  he 
set  to  work  to  patch  it  up  with  every  old  board  and 
piece  of  tin  and  bit  of  rusty  iron  he  could  find  about  the 
roads  and  back  yards.  When  the  prohibition  act  was 
passed,  and  the  tavern  had  to  be  closed  for  want  of  cus 
tom,  Jake  got  hold  of  the  old  sign  and  tacked  it  over  his 
front  door,  where  it  now  displays  a  badly  fore-shortened 
horse  and  a  gig  in  an  advanced  stage  of  dissolution. 
This  he  looks  upon  as  the  art  gem  of  the  place.  His 
unique  mansion  was  crowned  with  glory  by  a  young 
painter  who  came  to  board  in  the  village  last  summer. 
This  misguided  young  person  admired  Jake's  singular 
abode  more  than  any  of  the  new  Queen  Annes  that  are 
cropping  up  here  and  there  in  the  neighborhood,  and 
made  a  sketch  of  its  picturesque  confusion,  with  children, 
pigs,  and  chickens  running  about  in  the  foreground. 
Jake  says  he  got  five  hundred  dollars  for  it  down  in 
"  York."  But  nobody  believes  Jake,  and  it  is  one  of 
his  good  points  that  he  never  expects  belief  in  any 
thing  he  affirms  and  is  ready  to  take  his  Bible  oath  on. 

Jake's  wife,  unlike  the  usual  type  of  such  unfortunates, 
is  round  and  fat,  and  very  easy  in  temper.  She  is  in 
clined  to  think  that  her  husband  is  a  pretty  smart  man, 
because  he  manages  to  keep  the  "  gore,"  and  to  get 
along  without  any  visible  means  of  subsistence.  Indeed, 
she  rather  admires  Jake,  and  herself,  and  the  children, 
because  they  appear  to  be  under  the  special  protection  of 
Heaven.  She  takes  in  washing  when  she  can  get  it,  and 
at  other  times,  the  neighbors  say,  sits  right  down  in  the 
dirt  as  if  she  expected  Elijah's  ravens  to  come  and  feed 
her.  Jake  says  he  intends  to  live  to  the  age  of  ninety, 
for  if  he  were  to  die  before  Sally,  she  would  surely  let  the 
land  slip  right  through  her  fingers,  and  then  he  would 
"jest  turn  in  his  coffin." 

Jake  Small  is  a  happy  man.  It  is  a  blessed  and  envi 
able  thing  to  be  able  to  hector  the  judge,  to  be  his  gad- 


1 6  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

fly,  the  thorn  in  his  side,  the  crumpled  rose  leaf  in  the 
rich  man's  bed,  who,  when  he  walks  the  street,  seems  to 
say,  "  I  am  the  man  who  planted  the  common,  who  built 
the  library,  who  repaired  the  church  and  put  in  the  new 
organ,"  as  plainly  as  if  he  carried  so  many  placards 
about  his  person  announcing  these  interesting  facts. 
Then,  Jake  Small,  from  time  immemorial  has  been  in  the 
love  secrets  of  all  the  girls  and  boys  in  the  village.  There 
is  nothing  he  enjoys  so  much  as  what  he  calls  a  first-class 
love  case,  where  the  old  folks  are  opposed  and  the  young 
folks  "  have  taken  the  bit  between  their  teeth."  A 
qveerer  Cupid's  postman  was  never  seen,  but  all  the  bil 
lets  intrusted  to  his  care  are  delivered  with  the  utmost 
secrecy  and  dispatch.  This  business,  besides  being  very 
congenial  to  Jake's  mind,  is  lucrative.  The  girls  are 
always  ready  to  bestow  a  quarter  on  him  for  secret  ser 
vice,  and  the  young  men  of  course  pay  much  more  liber 
ally. 

Although  not  as  instructive  as  the  new  library,  nor  as 
refreshing  as  the  common,  nor  as  clean  and  holy  as  the 
church,  Jake  Small  is  an  institution  the  village  could  ill 
afford  to  spare.  There  are  set,  obstinate  old  folks  who 
uphold  him  about  the  land,  because  they  know  if  they 
had  a  gore  lying  so  advantageously  for  the  torment  of  a 
rich  neighbor,  they  could  not  forego  the  pleasure  it  would 
give  them.  As  Jake  says,  "  human  motives  is  mixed." 
There  is  a  diffused  feeling  of  kindness  toward  Jake  in 
the  village,  rather  sneaking,  but  genuine.  Even  the 
judge,  when  all  the  Small  children  came  down  with  the 
scarlet  fever,  paid  surreptitiously  out  of  his  own  pocket 
for  the  needful  medicine.  The  Small  children  have  a 
characteristic  way  of  getting  ill  simultaneously,  with  any 
infant  disease  that  happens  to  be  about ;  then  the  neigh 
bors  go  in  and  scrub  up  every  nook  and  corner  of  the 
house.  Good,  pious  women  take  in  clothing  and  furni 
ture,  and  fill  the  larder  to  overflowing,  so  that  the  poor- 


JUDGE  MAGNUS.  i? 

spirited  "  Miss  Small  "  has  reason  to  look  upon  measles, 
or  diphtheria,  or  whatever  the  complaint  may  be,  as  a 
blessing  in  disguise  ;  and  she  placidly  waits  until  the 
next  dispensation  of  childish  ailments  comes  along  to 
help  her  out  of  her  chronic  hobble. 

There  is  always  a  full-blown  odor  of  patronage  about 
the  judge  which  corresponds  to  his  Doric-pillared  house, 
his  fine  stable,  and  handsome  garden.  If  there  were  not 
people  about  him  to  condescend  to,  life  would  not  be 
worth  the  living.  For  this  reason  he  vegetates  in  a  ham 
let  instead  of  living  eclipsed  and  shorn  of  his  beams  in  a 
city.  Here  he  is  the  richest  man,  the  top  of  the  heap. 
But  his  vanity  is  so  transparent  it  passes  for  a  decoration, 
and  his  neighbors  could  not  get  on  without  the  judge  any 
more  than  without  Jake  Small.  Both  of  them  are  essen 
tial  to  the  village. 


CHAPTER  III. 

PARADISE    FARM    AND    AUNT    DIDO. 

THIS  clear,  cold  winter  afternoon  the  village  walks 
are  scraped  clean  of  snow,  the  roads  are  packed 
hard  as  iron.  White  barricades  rise  in  all  the  yards  and 
along  the  street.  The  snow  crunches  and  grinds  to 
marble-powder  under  foot,  and  overhead  it  shakes  down 
from  the  elm  boughs  in  showers  as  sharp  as  steel  filings. 
There  is  a  sparkle  from  the  solid  blue  sky  diffused 
through  all  the  air,  and  one  must  adjust  the  breathing 
apparatus  to  new  conditions.  The  mere  act  of  inspira 
tion  is  a  species  of  excitement  ;  and  a  great  tide  of 
fresh  blood  brings  a  bloom  like  that  of  youth  to  old 
faces. 

The  ice  on  the  river  and  pond  to-day  has  that  dull 
semi-translucency,  with  long  reaches  of  glitter  and  shine 
in  the  distance,  that  make  one's  feet  ache  for  runners. 
Come  down  the  road  for  a  quarter  of  a  mile  where  it  dips 
and  winds  so  prettily,  to  the  old  bridge  spanning  the 
river.  It  was  once  a  toll-bridge,  but  tolls  are  taken  there 
no  longer  ;  and  even  the  injunction  not  to  drive  your 
horse  faster  than  a  walk,  under  penalty  of  the  law,  is 
disregarded  by  every  old  hack  and  broken-winded  jade 
in  the  township.  The  bridge  was  covered,  originally,  but 
the  crazy  old  top  blew  off  in  a  gale  of  wind,  and  it  is  now 
the  roosting  and  angling  place  of  all  the  children  and 
idlers  in  the  village. 

The  small  river  curves  away  through  low  meadows 
and  gently  swelling  breasts  of  hills  in  the  laziest  man 
ner.  It  is  like  a  long  narrow  scarf  of  dull  blue  some 


SKATING.  19 

gadding  nymph  has  dropped  and  trailed  with  her  bus- 
kined  foot.  With  the  thin  lines  of  fences  and  young 
trees  making  small  shadows,  the  world  all  white,  and  the 
sky  all  blue,  one  thinks  of  Luca  Delia  Robbia's  altar- 
pieces,  the  perfection  of  blue  and  white  glaze.  It  would 
be  monotonous  without  the  lovely  outlines  of  hills  cast 
ing  such  pure  shadows  on  their  sunless  slopes. 

The  sluggish  river  winds  about  in  great  serpentine 
curves  through  very  low  grassy  banks  and  groups  of 
trees  that  in  summer  time  look  as  if  they  were  made  for 
the  poet  and  artist.  But  now  all  the  ferns  and  grasses 
and  wild  things  are  frosted  over,  and  the  river's  secrets 
are  as  open  to  the  eye  as  a  gossip's  heart,  save  where  a 
clump  of  evergreens,  lusty  and  full  of  life,  breaks  in 
with  a  soul-warming  cheer.  The  ice  is  in  a  perfect  state 
to-day,  and  half  the  village  folk  are  on  the  river.  There 
is  the  doctor's  girl,  in  her  scarlet-trimmed  costume,  with 
the  light  locks  floating  behind  her  as  she  deftly  cuts  the 
figure-8  on  the  ice.  And  the  old  doctor  has  actually 
mounted  skates  and  is  skimming  away  with  his  girl's 
mittened  hand  in  his  and  his  coat  tails  standing  out 
stiffly  in  the  breeze.  With  his  fur  cap  and  frosty  glitter 
ing  beard,  he  looks  like  the  Santa  Glaus  of  the  picture- 
books.  As  usual  he  is  spouting  poetry  at  the  top  of  his 
voice,  but  at  this  distance  I  can  hardly  make  out  the 
lines.  They  have  gone  under  the  bridge,  and  the  laugh 
ter  of  his  granddaughter  comes  up  like  the  twitter  of 
young  birds  in  June.  The  young  clergyman  is  also  out 
on  skates,  and  he  has  brought  his  oldest  child,  a  mere 
tot  of  three,  and  is  riding  her  on  his  shoulder  as  he  spins 
along,  to  her  infinite  delight.  It  is  just  over  this  part  of 
the  river  where  the  doctor,  and  parson,  and  Hugh,  that 
young  scapegrace  of  a  lawyer,  race  in  their  boats  in  sum 
mer,  each  pulling  a  mighty  oar.  Hugh  is  a  back-handed, 
unregenerate  friend  of  the  parson — was  in  college  with 
him,  I  believe.  The  village  has  as  much  need  of  Hugh 


20  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

as  a  coach  has  of  a  fifth  wheel,  and  yet  he  has  a  kind  of 
use  in  keeping  things  stirred  up  and  getting  himself 
talked  about.  Milly,  the  milliner,  seeing  him  stride  off 
on  excursions  with  the  clergyman,  has  slyly  named  them 
the  Law  and  the  Gospel.  Hugh,  the  lawyer,  with  his 
briefless  pockets  and  his  Homeric  laugh,  is  a  character 
not  to  be  ignored. 

All  the  village  boys  are  out  on  the  ice  either  sliding  or 
skating.  Their  shrill  voices  echo  along  the  banks  as 
they  skylark  and  indulge  in  every  species  of  horse-play. 
The  skating-boy  comes  nearer  a  tadpole  in  his  awkward 
sprawl  than  anything  that  navigates.  But  the  little  girls 
are  all  charmingly  rhythmical  in  their  exquisite  grace  of 
motion.  The  swish  of  their  skirts  has  music  in  it,  as 
they  skim  over  the  icy  floor,  and  make  a  delicate  etch 
ing  on  its  smooth  surface.  They  follow  the  curves 
and  windings  of  the  stream  to  the  upper  bridge,  with 
arms  interlocked  and  hands  hidden  in  little  muffs,  moving 
to  the  beat  of  some  melody  heard  only  by  their  ears. 
Their  eyes  shine  and  their  cheeks  glow  with  exer 
cise,  and  when  the  red  sunset  shines  out  from  under  a 
low  purple  cloud  it  flashes  down  the  river  and  diffuses  a 
rosy  bloom  around  these  happy  children,  while  the  snow 
fields  take  on  the  softest  blush,  like  the  lining  of  a  sea 
shell,  and  the  shadow  side  of  their  knolls  are  pure  ultra 
marine,  or  palpitating  violet,  or  even  a  delicate  shade  of 
green.  The  evening  red  strikes  boldly  on  the  side  of 
Saddleback  and  flames  among  the  higher  cedars  and  hem 
locks,  while  the  lower  ranges  of  the  mountain  are  plunged 
in  splendid  gloom,  a  kind  of  blood-shot  black  melting 
into  a  band  of  blue  quite  indescribable,  for  there  is  noth 
ing  else  like  it  in  nature  or  art,  unless  it  be  that  azure 
zone  of  the  earth  on  which  the  glorified  Virgin  sits  in  the 
imagination  of  old  painters.  A  fringe  of  flame  runs 
crinkling  along  the  serrated  skeleton  trees  on  top  of  the 
mountain,  where  they  stand  out  so  dark  in  places  against 


VIEW  FROM  PUDDING  KNOLL.  21 

the  perfect  rose  of  the  heavens.  But  look  !  the  village 
windows  are  all  ablaze,  and  the  library  looms  up  like  a 
huge  castle  illumined  for  a  festival  ;  and  the  top  of  the 
church  spire  sparkles  as  if  it  had  impaled  the  evening 
star. 

There  is  only  a  quarter  of  an  hour  left  before  dark  for 
a  run  to  the  top  of  Pudding  Knoll  and  a  peep  down  into 
the  little  valley  below.  It  is  the  choicest  spot  about  the 
village  and  has  been  appropriately  named  Paradise  Farm. 
The  house  stands  at  exactly  the  right  angle  facing  the 
east,  and  is  a  most  picturesque  jumble  of  pale,  silvery, 
unpainted  buildings.  Before  it  rise  two  tall  Lombardy 
poplars,  like  sons  of  Anak.  They  are  admirably  pic 
turesque  in  the  winter  landscape,  and  are  so  placed  they 
can  be  seen  for  miles  up  and  down  the  river.  The  barns 
to  the  north  are  sheltered  by  a  sugar  camp,  where  the 
maple  trees  grow  straight  and  clean  as  columns  in  a 
temple.  This  grove  is  a  splendid  patch  of  color  in 
October  when  it  is  changed  by  the  finger  of  the  frost. 
There  are  snug  orchards  and  gardens  and  poultry-yards 
about  this  farm-house,  and  the  fields  slope  down  to  the 
river  in  a  manner  truly  Arcadian.  Its  view  opens  gently 
to  the  principal  valley  of  the  local  mountain  like  a  deco 
rated  side  chapel  looking  into  the  nave  of  some  stately 
cathedral,  while  all  around  are  cheerful  little  hills  per 
fectly  well  wooded  and  watered,  and  in  summer  full  of 
flowery  nooks  and  singing  birds. 

This  farm  ought  to  belong  to  a  poet,  but  it  is  owned 
by  Rastus,  and  the  mother  of  Rastus,  who  is  the  egg 
and  butter  woman  of  the  village.  Any  fine  day  you  may 
see  the  old  lady  mounted  in  a  high-backed  wagon  driv 
ing  into  the  village  a  spavined  horse,  blind  of  one  eye, 
her  baskets  and  firkins  comfortably  stowed  away  beside 
her.  She  is  still  strong  and  ruddy-looking,  like  a  late 
Baldwin  apple,  which,  though  seamed  and  shriveled  a 
little  by  frost,  retains  its  high  color.  The  old  dame 


22  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

seems  happy  enough  with  Rastus,  but  still  she  regrets 
her  late  husband,  now  lying  in  the  burying-ground,  who 
was  known  to  the  neighbors  as  a  very  handy  man.  A 
handy  man  has  no  significance  in  a  city  household. 
There  is  always  a  workman  on  the  next  block,  or  round 
the  corner,  who  can  fasten  a  screw,  or  tighten  a  bolt,  or 
mend  a  lock  ;  but  it  is  very  different  in  a  small  village 
or  on  a  farm.  There  the  man,  the  head  of  the  house,  is 
twice  as  valuable  if  he  can  mend  a  pump  when  it  gives 
out,  or  correct  a  smoky  chimney,  or  put  up  a  shelf  for  the 
women  folk.  What  wonder  a  village  man  is  esteemed  in 
direct  ratio  with  his  handiness  !  The  father  of  Rastus 
was  eminently  a  handy  man.  His  jack-knife  was  a  mys 
tic  tool,  with  which  he  performed  admirable  works  in 
kitchen  and  pantry.  Every  cupboard  door  had  its  but 
ton,  every  lock  was  well  oiled  before  the  poor  man  took 
that  inscrutable  disease,  located  in  the  pit  of  his  stomach, 
and  extending  to  the  small  of  his  back,  until  it  finally 
went  to  his  head  and  baffled  the  skill  of  all  the  doctors, 
besides  furnishing  a  fruitful  subject  of  conversation  to 
his  apple-cheeked  widow  for  the  remainder  of  her  life. 

Sadly  enough,  Rastus  has  not  inherited  his  father's 
handiness.  Rastus  is  in  fact  remarkably  slow  and 
"  pokey,"  with  a  moderation  of  ideas  and  movements, 
and  a  blundering  way  of  doing  things  eminently  original. 
He  is  tall  and  rather  shambling  in  his  gait,  while  his  nose 
describes  a  very  strange  angle  not  set  down  in  any  of  the 
geometries,  and  his  mouth  has  a  tendency  to  stand  slightly 
ajar.  Oddly  enough,  Rastus,  though  in  no  sense  a  comic 
character,  always  excites  mirth.  The  whole  village  bursts 
into  an  unrestrained  roar  of  laughter  when  Rastus  begins 
to  narrate  his  adventures  while  at  the  war.  He  was  taken 
prisoner  by  the  enemy,  and  shut  up  over  night  in  a  hen 
house,  with  nothing  to  eat.  In  the  morning  the  "  rebs  " 
were  obliged  to  beat  a  hasty  retreat,  and  they  forgot  all 
about  Rastus,  and  left  him  in  the  henhouse,  from  which 


RASTUS.  23 

he  escaped  by  a  series  of  thrilling  adventures.  There  is 
nothing  really  funny  connected  with  this  story,  and 
Rastus  is  very  fond  of  telling  it.  He  likes  in  his  slow 
way  to  "  wave  the  bloody  shirt,"  but  now  for  a  good 
many  years  he  has  been  greeted  with  such  unseemly  signs 
of  mirth  when  he  has  tried  to  narrate  his  hairbreadth 
'scapes  connected  with  the  late  unpleasantness,  that 
he  has  grown  very  shy  of  drawing  the  long-bow  in 
the  company  of  an  irreverent  villager.  He  gener 
ally  reserves  his  war  stories  for  the  ear  of  some  patient 
stranger  who  happens  to  be  staying  in  the  neighborhood. 
Last  year  he  found  a  summer  boarder  who  was  remark 
ably  long  suffering  in  this  regard,  but  it  turned  out  that 
he  wanted  to  buy  Paradise  Farm.  Rastus  took  a  week 
to  think  over  the  proposal,  which  was  an  excellent  one, 
and  after  a  great  deal  of  chewing  of  straw  in  the  barn  he 
repaired  to  his  new  friend  : 

"  I  'low  I  can't  sell  the  old  place  anyhow,"  said  Ras 
tus  ;  "  mother  won't  part  with  her  thirds,  and  without  the 
thirds  the  land  wouldn't  vally  much.  And  then,  you  see," 
scratching  his  head,  "  dad,  he  lived  here,  and  granddad, 
and  great-granddad  afore  him,  and  if  I  live  long  enough 
I  expect  to  leave  the  old  place  to  my  son." 

"  Oh,  you  do,"  said  the  stranger,  dryly  looking  at  the 
incorrigible  old  bachelor  with  a  twinkle  of  his  eye. 

"  Yes,  I  do.  Mother's  getting  stiff  in  the  j'ints,  and  I 
shall  have  to  provide  for  the  future." 

The  stranger  did  not  renew  his  proposal,  but  the  idea 
which  had  taken  root  in  the  mind  of  Rastus  worked  like 
a  very  slow  process  of  fermentation.  Rastus  is  a  very 
forehanded  farmer,  and  secures  some  of  that  kind  of  con 
sideration  which  money  always  brings. 

On  the  road  to  the  "  Hollow,"  quite  at  the  other  end 
of  the  village,  is  a  little  brown  house  that  seems  to  cling 
to  the  earth  like  a  ground-bird's  nest.  It  is  the  home  of 
Aunt  Dido  (an  absurd  abbreviation  of  Diadema),  the 


24  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

sister  of  Rastus's  mother.  She  differs  materially  from 
her  close-fisted  relatives,  and  is,  in  fact,  a  survival  of  a 
vanishing  village  species — the  good-natural  cook,  the  old- 
fashioned  housekeeper,  a  person  who  before  the  days  of 
cooking  schools  was  supposed  to  take  as  naturally  to  all 
the  mysteries  of  the  culinary  art  as  a  duck  takes  to  water. 
Such  a  person  enjoys  heartily  the  pleasures  of  the  table, 
and  herein,  perhaps,  lies  the  secret  of  her  genius.  No 
nervous,  thin-blooded,  narrow-chested  woman  who  lives 
by  the  week  on  tea  and  toast  ever  became  a  great  cook, 
with  local  fame  resounding  far  and  wide,  for  flap-jacks, 
crullers,  spice-cakes,  pumpkin  and  mince  pies,  and  all  the 
endless  variety  of  New  England  concoctions.  Aunt  Dido 
especially  prides  herself  on  her  exquisite  bread  and 
biscuits.  Any  fool,  she  says,  can  make  a  good  cake  after 
a  recipe,  but  only  a  woman  of  genius  knows  how  to  turn 
out  a  fine  domestic  loaf  of  bread. 

Aunt  Dido  is  large  and  broad  and  glowing  with  vital 
ity.  When  she  walks  she  makes  a  breeze,  and  when  she 
runs,  as  she  sometimes  does,  just  to  work  off  her  super 
fluous  vigor,  she  creates  a  whirlwind.  Her  throne  is  her 
kitchen  rocker,  and  her  scepter  is  a  great  iron  spoon 
which  she  flourishes  in  the  most  artistic  manner  while 
engaged  at  one  and  the  same  moment  in  conversation 
and  cookery.  She  is  more  than  a  cook — she  is  a  woman 
of  ideas.  She  threw  herself  into  the  abolition  cause,  into 
the  temperance  reform,  and  a  few  years  ago  she  became 
a  religious  free  light.  There  is  generally  some  very 
"  advanced  "  book,  rather  shocking  to  the  ideas  of  her 
more  conservative  neighbors,  turned  down  on  the  corner 
of  her  kitchen  table,  to  be  picked  up  and  read  at  odd 
moments.  You  should  see  her  kitchen,  more  beautiful 
than  any  parlor  in  its  spotless,  immaculate  niceness.  No 
one  ever  intrudes  there  irreverently,  not  even  her  small, 
meek  husband,  who  sometimes  asks  the  privilege  of  wip 
ing  his  hands  on  the  jack-towel.  The  odors  that  proceed 


AUNT  DIDO.  25 

from  that  kitchen  are  enough  to  warm  the  cockles  of  the 
heart.  It  is  said  that  you  can  smell  Aunt  Dido's  coffee 
'way  down  in  Saw  Mill  Hollow,  half  a  mile  from  the 
brown  cottage. 

Aunt  Dido  is  by  no  means  forehanded.  She  is  far  too 
generous  and  large-hearted  to  lay  up  an  excess  of  goods 
anywhere  but  in  heaven.  Her  penurious  relations  say 
that  she  might  fatten  two  pigs  and  keep  a  cow  on  what 
she  gives  away  every  year  to  tramps  and  children.  She 
does  fine  baking  for  the  richer  neighbors,  there  being  no 
bake-shop  in  the  village,  and  Mrs.  Judge  Magnus  often 
bespeaks  bread,  and  cakes,  and  pies,  and  even  cooked 
meats  which  are  to  furnish  forth  the  feast  for  some  dig 
nitary  at  the  great  house.  She  is  childless,  but  she  de 
serves  to  be  called  the  mother  of  the  village,  for  all  the 
idle,  vagrant,  ill-conditioned  urchins  that  hang  about  the 
place  get  a  vast  amount  of  coddling,  petting,  and  feeding 
from  her  hands.  The  mother  of  Rastus  has  solemnly 
warned  her  sister  that  if  she  should  ever  come  to  pov 
erty,  she  must  not  look  to  her  for  help.  But  Aunt 
Dido  goes  on  spoiling  the  rising  generation  to  her 
heart's  content.  She  has  an  amount  of  sympathy  for 
the  so-called  bad  boy  that  is  perfectly  disreputable  in  a 
person  of  her  years,  and  by  people  of  grave  and  severe 
virtue  is  looked  upon  as  a  demoralizing  influence  in  the 
community.  For  years  she  has  constantly  kept  on  hand 
in  her  buttery  a  large  jar  of  caraway-seed  cakes  of  a 
most  delicious  and  toothsome  variety,  which  she  gives 
to  the  village  children  when  by  mere  accident  they  hap 
pen  to  pass  her  door  on  the  way  to  school.  When  her 
prudent  sister  suggested  that  she  might  turn  a  pretty 
penny  by  selling  her  cakes  to  the  ever- hungry  urchins, 
she  was  scandalized  by  the  mere  suggestion — she  who 
had  always  been  the  village  almoner. 

Last  summer  she  noticed  a  small  black-eyed  urchin, 
with  several  varieties  of  soil  on  his  face  and  hands,  who 


26  VILLA  (//•-'    t'110  I'OC.KA  /'/AS'. 


more  regularly  for  the  dole  than  any  of  the  other 
Kuls.  I  U-  would  st-t  up  a  most  piteous  wail  just  at  the 
moment  <>t  ivarhing  her  gate,  and  exhibit  wounds  which 
seemed  to  have  been  made  by  barking  his  little  brown 
stuns  on  a  stone  wall,  or  scratching  "  hisself,"  as  he  said, 
in  a  bramble-bush,  much  to  the  detriment  of  a  very 
ras^fd  pair  of  trowsers.  He  was  a  cunning  little  rascal, 
and  Aunt  Dido  knew  in  a  general  way  that  he  waK  one  of 
Jake  Small's  numerous  brood.  She  could  never  forbear 
taking  him  in  and  comforting  him  with  goodies.  But 
the  same  appeal  to  her  feelings  was  made  so  often  by 
this  pertinacious  youngster,  as  he  exhibited  the  gory 
stains  on  his  feet  and  legs  where  he  had  "  hurted  "  him 
self,  that  Aunt  Dido  began  to  suspect  he  was  playing  on 
her  very  tender  heart  by  staining  those  nut-brown  feet 
and  ankles  with  pokeberry  juife  or  something  else  of  a 
vegetable  nature.  The  wounds  certainly  did  look  sus 
picious  ;  so  one  day  she  seized  the  boy  with  her  firm, 
large  hand,  and  hurrying  him  into  her  woodshed  cham 
ber  stripped  off  his  poor  little  duds  of  things  and  buried 
him  in  a  great  tub  of  warm  water,  while  she  administered 
a  plentiful  lathering  of  strong  soap  —  in  perfect  silence. 
Bill,  when  he  described  the  operation  later,  said  :  "  First 
it  was  kerswish,  and  then  it  was  kerswash,"  and  then  he 
had  to  "holler"  because  he  was  "  drownded."  But  the 
old  lady  wouldn't  "  let  up  on  him  "  until  she  had  scrub 
bed  every  inch  of  his  skin.  Later  she  placed  him  on  a 
chair,  done  up  like  a  mummy  in  a  blanket  and  proceeded 
to  cut  and  comb  his  gipsy  locks.  She  even  scrubbed  out 
his  mouth,  and  then  put  him  to  bed  until  she  had  mended 
his  clothes. 

When  Bill  again  went  forth  into  the  light  of  things,  he 
was  a  changed  boy.  His  own  father  and  mother  scarcely 
knew  him.  The  nearest  neighbors  had  always  supposed 
that  Bill  was  dark  "  complected,"  but  after  that  vigorous 
scrubbing  he  came  out  exceptionally  fair.  The  boys 


BILL   SM ALL'S  ADVENTURE.  27 

teased  Bill  unmercifully  over  this  adventure,  and  for 
three  days  he  was  strongly  inclined  to  take  to  the  woods 
and  hunt  wild  Indians  the  remainder  of  his  life.  He  will 
never  make  sham  wounds  and  scratches  on  his  legs  again 
with  pokeberry  juice,  and  he  now  fights  very  shy  of  the 
little  brown  cottage.  Since  this  occurrence  Aunt  Dido's 
"  stock  "  has  risen  among  the  boys  of  the  vicinage.  They 
now  know  she  keeps  her  weather  eye  open,  and  respect 
her  accordingly.  Aunt  Dido  did  get  a  great  deal  of  sat 
isfaction  out  of  her  bout  with  little  Bill,  and  she  is  ready 
to  own  it  any  day  as  she  laughs  over  the  story  until  the 
tears  fill  her  eyes. 


CHAPTER    IV. 

HUGH  THE  DRUID,  ROSE    MADDER  THE  IMPRESSIONIST. 

AUNT  DIDO  has  one  regular  boarder — the  young 
lawyer  known  as  Hugh — a  tall,  easy,  unconventional 
young  man,  a  local  antiquary,  an  excellent  oarsman,  and 
a  great  walker.  He  is  always  ready  to  attend  to  any 
body's  business  but  his  own — indeed,  his  own  personal 
business  is  an  unknown  quantity.  His  mouth  is  generally 
seen  stretched  from  ear  to  ear  in  a  huge  laugh  over  his 
own  joke,  or  at  the  expense  of  somebody  else.  The  fun 
bubbles  up  in  him  from  a  consciousness  of  the  latent 
comic  elements  lying  all  about  in  the  neighborhood  which 
nobody  sees  but  himself.  It  must  be  confessed  that 
Hugh  sometimes  carries  his  jokes  too  far  and  makes 
enemies  for  the  time  being  ;  but  it  is  impossible  to  remain 
long  angry  with  a  humorist  who  perpetually  feels  the 
laugh  tickling  his  midriff  and  rising  in  him  as  little  jets 
of  gas  dance  about  in  an  effervescing  mineral  water. 

He  lounges  in  all  the  village  parlors — comes  in  and 
goes  out  like  a  cat,  without  ceremony,  and  takes  liberties 
which  in  any  one  else  might  seem  offensive,  but  with 
Hugh  are  rather  graceful.  The  villagers  say  that  Hugh 
is  "  a  case."  The  pretty  girls  say  it  with  a  little  smirk 
and  blush  ;  the  old  maids  say  it  with  a  certain  bridling 
touch  of  self-consciousness,  as  if  they  had  now  and  then 
encountered  the  young  man's  impertinence  ;  the  nice 
old  ladies  say  it  with  a  half-smile  of  relenting,  indicative 
of  a  soft  spot  in  their  hearts  for  the  scapegrace.  He 
pretends  that  he  is  busily  engaged  looking  up  a  law  busi 
ness  more  difficult  to  find  than  the  traditional  needle  in 


ANTIQUARIAN    TASTES.  29 

a  bale  of  hay.  He  has  in  vain  tried  to  excite  a  little 
legal  irritation  by  rubbing  the  neighbors  the  wrong  way, 
and  artfully  stirring  up  lucrative  discord.  But  he  can 
not  show  even  one  cow  case  for  his  pains.  Most  of  the 
village  folk  are  too  shrewd  and  close-fisted  to  be  drawn 
into  what  they  call  "  Jawing,"  with  its  concomitant  bill 
of  expenses.  They  generally  "  fix  things  up  "  by  arbi 
tration.  The  doctor  has  probably  done  more  arbitrating 
without  pay  than  any  other  man  in  the  United  States. 

Hugh,  having  no  active  business  in  the  legal  line, 
interests  himself  in  the  titles  to  estates,  in  old  deeds  and 
wills,  and  the  bits  of  local  history  bedded  in  such  musty 
parchments.  This  useless  kind  of  erudition  is  very  much 
to  his  mind.  He  has  up  in  his  queer  attic  chamber  at 
Aunt  Dido's  a  collection  of  old  seals— impressions  in 
wax  and  plaster — that  is  very  curious.  He  is  deeply 
engrossed,  too,  in  black-letter  literature,  and  seldom  cares 
to  read  any  thing  less  than  150  years  old.  His  room  is 
an  interesting  museum  of  old  books  in  various  languages. 
He  has  discovered  that  several  of  the  farms  in  the 
neighborhood  are  held  under  the  original  grants  from 
English  sovereigns  in  colonial  times.  Although  he  reads 
almost  nothing  that  is  modern,  he  writes  for  some  news 
papers  and  magazines,  and  has  been  heard  to  say  that 
he  intends  to  produce  the  great  American  novel  in  an 
autobiographic  work  v/ith  himself  for  the  hero.  But 
Hugh  could  never  be  as  effective  in  print  as  he  is  in 
person.  When  he  takes  pen  in  hand  he  becomes  rather 
heavy  and  solemn.  His  fun  must  froth  out  at  the 
moment  of  production,  and  it  is  impossible  to  preserve 
it  in  printer's  ink. 

The  old  maids,  as  I  have  hinted,  regard  him  rather 
kindly,  his  taste  in  women  being  somewhat  omnivorous. 
He  keeps  an  eye  out  for  all  the  pretty  girls,  and  will  run 
half-a-mile  to  peep  under  a  smart  hat  at  a  blooming 
face,  but  his  impudence  is  only  the  unquenchable  vivac- 


3°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

city  of  young  spirits,  and  really  means  nothing  ;  if  the 
girls  take  him  too  seriously,  that  is  their  lookout.  He  is 
always  on  a  "  lark,"  and  instead  of  finding  the  after-effects 
vapid,  his  appetite  seems  to  grow  with  what  it  feeds  on. 
It  is  pleasant  and  surprising  to  discover  a  human  being 
who  has  such  an  insatiable  interest  in  the  mere  act  of 
living.  Some  people  say  Aunt  Dido  has  spoiled  Hugh 
with  her  good  cooking  and  her  much  coddling,  and  that 
if  he  never  amounts  to  a  "  row  of  pins,"  it  will  be  entirely 
her  fault.  But  this  is  doing  Aunt  Dido  great  injustice, 
who  gives  Hugh  the  best  of  advice,  which  he  takes  great 
pains  never  to  follow. 

He  is  intimate  with  Milly,  and  often  appears  in  her 
little  parlor  of  an  evening  with  a  black-letter  folio  under 
his  arm.  In  summer  he  comes  in  his  slippers,  though 
the  road  be  damp,  wearing  his  big-flowered  dressing- 
gown,  without  a  hat,  and  smoking  a  long-stemmed  brier- 
wood  pipe.  He  is  the  only  human  being  who  would 
dare  to  smoke  in  Milly's  sitting-room  ;  he  has  never 
asked  her  permission,  and  she  tacitly  allows  it.  At  one 
time  it  was  thought  by  the  villagers  that  things  were 
looking  rather  serious  between  the  two,  although  Milly 
has  a  few  years  the  advantage  of  Hugh  in  age,  but 
within  a  year  a  young  lady  artist  has  come  to  the  village 
and  set  up  a  studio,  who  is  considered  the  most  inexplica 
ble  young  person  ever  seen  in  the  neighborhood. 

Rose  Madder  lives  over  Peckham's  grocery  store,  and 
has  hung  out  a  little  sign  which  says  that  there  pupils  are 
taught  crayon  and  water-color  drawing  and  china-paint 
ing.  Rose  wears  little  artistic  skimpy  gowns,  a  high- 
crowned  Tyrolean  hat,  and  a  bag  like  a  pilgrim's  scrip 
slung  over  her  shoulder  by  a  long  strap.  The  small 
sleeves  of  her  gown  have  queer  little  puffs  about  the 
elbows,  and  the  embroidery  on  her  skirt  looks  like  a  dis 
tracted  landscape.  Under  her  hat  she  is  all  hair  and  eyes 
with  a  white  moon  face  gleaming  out  in  dreamy  melan^ 


ROSE  LV  HEK   STCD/O.  31 

choly.  The  villagers  know  not  what  to  make  of  her, 
while  she  only  looks  at  them  with  a  view  as  to  whether 
they  will  "  compose."  I  am  sorry  to  say  most  of  them 
will  not ;  they  are  too  angular,  weather-beaten,  crooked, 
and  hard-visaged.  It  is  suspected  that  she  has  taken  up 
her  abode  in  the  village  because  she  can  live  here  on  next 
to  nothing. 

Hugh  made  no  end  of  fun  of  the  Madder  phenomenon 
when  she  first  appeared,  but  one  day  he  lounged  into  her 
studio  over  Peckham's  grocery  store,  as  he  lounges  in 
everywhere,  and  caught  her  making  her  solitary  luncheon 
on  bread  and  jam  and  a  Japanese  pot  of  tea,  eating  the 
jam  spread  on  the  bread,  in  child  fashion.  The  picture 
of  Rose,  backed  by  a  sage-green  Canton  flannel  curtain 
topped  by  a  bunch  of  peacock  plumes,  touched  the  sensi 
bilities  of  Hugh.  He  became  slightly  "  spooney,"  and  has 
since  maintained  relations  with  Rose  very  different  from 
those  he  keeps  up  with  Milly. 

Rose  has  not  the  remotest  conception  of  the  meaning 
of  his  jokes,  but  she  thinks  if  he  would  only  be  serious, 
and  cultivate  a  certain  cut  of  beard,  he  would  do  very 
well  in  a  sketch  as  Launcelot  to  her  Guinevere.  The 
neighbors  speak  of  her  as  if  she  were  an  exotic  bird  that 
has  lit  by  accident  under  the  village  elms.  Deacon  Hil- 
dreth's  wife  says  she  "  s'poses  she  hasn't  got  any  folks, 
and  she  don't  seem  to  possess  a  conscience  any  more  than 
a  katydid,  for  she  goes  off  sketching  on  Sunday  when  the 
rest  of  the  people  are  in  church."  Rose  is  always  looking 
out  for  "  effects,"  and  she  dabs  away  industriously  at 
little  bits  of  wayside  weeds,  thistles,  and  mullein-stalks, 
and  pins  them  up  against  the  sage-green  Canton  flannel 
curtain,  and  waits  for  somebody  to  buy  them.  Her  con 
tempt  for  the  inartistic  world  about  her  is  so  profound 
that  it  seems  to  frame  her  off  in  a  perpetual  frozen  calm. 
She  talks  very  little,  and  Mrs.  Judge  Magnus  has  not 
found  her  a  success  when  she  has  tried  to  introduce  her 


32  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

at  her  evenings.  She  has  posed  a  little  in  a  languid  way 
at  the  village  tea  parties,  but  as  there  is  no  one  to  know 
when  she  gets  in  a  good  light  and  becomes  effective,  it  is 
time  thrown  away. 

Milly  has  bought  one  or  two  of  her  sketches,  which  she 
has  hung  very  high  that  they  may  be  properly  viewed 
from  across  the  room.  This  is  the  way  Hugh  described 
one  of  Rose  Madder's  most  celebrated  pictures,  before  he 
became,  as  I  said,  slightly  "  spooney  ":  "  Sky  :  a  splash  of 
white  and  a  larger  splash  of  blue.  Middle  distance  :  a 
streak  of  intermediate  dirty  yellow.  Foreground  :  a  pretty 
large  daub  of  lightish  green,  with  several  black  serpents 
wriggling  on  end  intended  for  trees  standing  about  in  a 
field.  Then  a  spot  of  brown  to  indicate  a  pond  with  five 
vague  daubs  of  white  for  geese,  and  under  all,  the  legend  : 
"  '  Oh,  what  is  so  rare  as  a  day  in  June.'" 

Hugh  is  a  tremendous  walker.  He  makes  nothing  of 
a  tramp  of  twenty-five  or  thirty  miles  a  day.  His  legs 
are  long,  and  he  naturally  falls  into  a  kind  of  Indian 
"  lope  "  which  carries  him  over  the  ground  with  great 
ease.  The  parson  often  joins  him  on  these  rambles,  and 
then  Hugh  is  apt  to  take  himself  seriously,  and  they  fall 
into  those  close  and  confidential  talks  which  sincere  and 
sensitive  minds  seldom  indulge  in  except  in  the  open  air, 
when  sitting  to  rest  on  stumps  or  mossy  stones  or  the 
sharp  angle  of  a  rail  fence.  Nature  is  so  confiding  to  her 
lovers  she  leads  even  the  reticent  to  breathe  their  inmost 
convictions  out  in  her  confessional.  Hugh  calls  himself 
a  Druid.  Stretched  under  some  great  pine  or  oak,  with 
the  sweet  air  caressing  him,  he  will  often  indulge  in  an 
exposition  of  his  religious  views,  which  are  of  a  curious 
nature  and  lead  to  heated  discussions  with  his  friend  the 
theologian.  Hugh  believes  the  sentiment  of  worship  is 
best  excited  out  of  doors,  under  trees,  in  view  of  hills  or 
mountains,  or  beside  running  or  still  waters.  He  thinks 
the  face  of  a  flower  or  the  call  of  a  bird  can  awaken 


THE   DRUIDICAL    FAITH,  33 

deeper  religious  sentiments  than  any  temple  service  ever 
excited.  This  is  a  simple  spontaneous  offering  of  the 
heart  to  its  maker,  unpolluted  by  turbid  systems  of  theol 
ogy — the  clear  crystal  through  which  we  see  eye  to  eye 
with  Him  who  made  us.  Nowadays,  since  the  old  creeds 
are  so  much  shaken,  he  thinks  this  out-of-door  worship  is 
almost  the  only  pure  religious  sentiment  left  in  many 
callous,  worldly,  or  faithless  souls.  In  view  of  the  exquisite 
beauty  of  the  universe,  the  confirmed  skeptic  even  must  feel 
a  thrill  of  childlike  trust  and  love  toward  the  Author  of  the 
day,  the  night,  the  stars,  the  firmament,  the  wonderful  and 
supreme  order  that  reigns  around  us.  Out  of  this  species 
of  modern  nature  worship  he  thinks  will  come  the  founda 
tions  of  a  new  faith,  more  simple,  direct  and  unclouded, 
than  those  that  have  gone  before.  It  will  be  the  natural 
hymn  of  the  creature  to  the  Creator  in  this  exquisite 
world,  thrilling  with  the  profound  revelations  of  loveli 
ness  and  beneficence.  Beauty,  he  holds,  is  the  stumbling- 
block  of  the  materialist.  He  can  not  account  for  this 
spirit-bloom  spread  over  the  face  of  nature.  Jaded,  over 
wrought  minds,  burned  out  with  excitement,  nauseated 
with  folly,  and  the  pursuit  of  unreason,  or  blinded  and 
dazed  by  vain  ambitions — even  these  can  come  still  to 
the  old  service  under  the  sky,  and  like  Faust  can  weep 
again  to  find  the  world  so  sound  at  the  core. 

The  minister,  of  course,  can  not  accept  this  queer  kind 
of  Druidical  worship  as  sufficient  for  the  needs  of  sin 
ners.  Hugh's  faith  is  entirely  too  easy-going  to  secure 
safety  for  the  imperiled  soul  of  man.  But  the  influence  of 
his  friend  has  been  stimulating  in  many  ways.  It  has 
modified  his  preaching  more  than  he  would  be  willing  to 
admit.  Hugh  never  goes  to  church,  for  he  says  he  fears 
he  would  be  obliged  to  get  out  an  attachment  to  recover 
his  stolen  ideas.  So  they  tramp  about,  these  two  rather 
interesting  young  men,  and  preach  to  each  other  in  many 
wild  and  lovely  places. 


34  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

Their  walks  almost  always  tend  due  east  to  the  large 
tract  of  woodland  which  lies  about  the  foot  of  Saddle 
back  and  climbs  the  slope  of  the  mountain,  with  here 
and  there  a  small  rent  made  in  its  verdant  garment  by 
rough  clearings  for  pasture  land.  In  an  old  settlement 
like  the  village  there  are  myths  of  that  extensive  tract  of 
woods.  The  children  delight  in  the  story  of  a  bear  living 
on  Saddleback  within  the  past  twenty  years.  One  very 
cold  winter  night  he  trotted  down  to  a  lonely  farm-house 
on  the  hillside,  crept  into  the  store-room  and  ate  up  the 
Christmas  turkey  nicely  trussed  and  stuffed  for  roasting. 
That  bear  has  given  rise  to  a  great  many  charming 
stories,  and  has  produced  a  large  family  of  cubs. 

There  are  foxes  in  this  piece  of  woods,  and  many  rab 
bit  burrows.  The  local  ornithologist,  says  we  have  over 
twenty-five  species  of  birds  which  live  here  and  in  the 
adjacent  farm  lands,  among  them  the  splendid  red  oriole. 
Squirrels,  gray  and  red,  abound,  and  the  drum  of  the 
partridge  is  often  heard  in  October.  The  brook  coming 
down  from  Saddleback  makes  numerous  shady  pools, 
where  the  shy  woodland  creatures  resort  to  drink.  These 
pools  in  winter  are  mirrors  of  frosted  silver  set  in  brown 
carven  frames.  Paths,  made  by  boys  and  cattle,  run  in 
all  directions.  When  the  snow  is  on  the  ground,  Hugh 
makes  his  own  path,  guiding  himself,  as  the  Indians  do, 
by  the  moss  on  the  trees.  He  has  the  genius  of  wood 
craft  in  his  blood,  and  his  eye  and  ear  are  as  delicate 
and  sensitive  as  a  wild  creature's.  He  often  strikes  a 
bee  line  for  the  top  of  Saddleback,  where  in  winter  the 
view  is  very  extended.  It  looks  into  a  series  of  pocket 
valleys,  with  its  congeries  of  villages,  its  checker-work  of 
farms,  and  boundary  lines  of  fences  and  stone-walls. 
You  can  trace  the  windings  of  the  river  for  miles  and 
miles,  and  many  smaller  streams  running  into  it,  and 
many  belts  of  woodland  wedged  into  home  fields  or  de 
scending  the  hill-slopes  like  platoons  of  soldiers.  All 


WINTER   SCENES. 


35 


this  is  a  story  to  Hugh,  for  he  knows  more  about  the 
farms  and  their  titles  and  history  than  any  body  else. 
Every  blue  smoke  wreath  curling  up  in  the  still  winter 
air  becomes  garrulous  to  him  touching  what  has  gone  on 
under  the  roof. 


CHAPTER  V. 

RASTUS    THINKS   OF    GETTING    MARRIED. 

/CERTAIN  matters  of  importance  have  been  going  on 
V_y  in  the  village,  which  if  related  in  a  novel  would 
probably  not  be  believed.  I  only  ask  credence  for  them 
on  the  ground  that  truth  is  stranger  than  fiction. 

One  winter  day,  just  at  the  beginning  of  a  thaw,  when 
all  the  elm  boughs  dripped,  and  little  pools  of  ice-water 
stood  collected  in  the  snowy  road,  Milly  sat  in  her  work 
room  trimming  a  new  hat  for  Rose  Madder.  It  was  one 
of  the  high-crowned  affairs  ;  and  Rose  had  sent  her  a 
sketch  to  show  just  how  she  wished  it  to  look  when  fin 
ished.  It  was  placed  on  a  block  in  front  of  Milly  while 
she  bowed  up  a  large  quantity  of  parti-colored  ribbon 
for  its  adornment.  Enter  Jake  Small  in  an  overcoat  two 
sizes  two  large  for  him,  which  Grandfather  Andrews  had 
given  him  out  of  his  store  of  old  clothes  for  a  Christmas 
present.  The  collar  of  this  garment  was  turned  up 
above  his  ears  so  that  he  seemed  buried  alive.  Milly 
often  employed  Jake  to  carry  bundles  and  band-boxes  to 
distant  farm-houses  and  the  more  remote  village  homes  : 
"  I  haven't  any  jobs  to-day,"  she  called  out  without  turn 
ing  'round. 

But  Jake  didn't  go.  He  hemmed  and  hawed,  and 
stood  first  on  one  foot  and  then  on  the  other.  "  But  I've 
a  leetle  job  of  my  own,"  said  Jake  at  last  mysteriously 
behind  her  back. 

"Well,  what  is  it?"  quoth  Milly,  still  intent  on  pin 
ning  snips  of  ribbon  on  the  hat  before  her,  and  cocking 
her  head  this  way  and  that  to  study  the  effect. 


RASTUS   THINKS  OF  GETTING  ZfARRIED.        37 

"  What  du  you  think  of  Rastus  B.?M  Jake  hitched  a 
little  nearer,  and  emitted  the  words  in  a  loud  whisper 
that  they  might  not  reach  the  ears  of  the  small  apprentice 
at  the  other  end  of  the  room. 

"  I  don't  think  any  thing  of  him,"  Milly  replied  calmly, 
but  now  she  did  look  'round. 

"  Wa'l  he  thinks  a  sight  of  you." 

"  Does  he  ? "  said  Milly,  with  a  touch  of  surprise  in 
her  voice.  "  I'm  very  much  obliged  to  Rastus." 

Jake  drew  near  by  another  hitch  or  two,  twirling  his  old 
hat  between  his  hands.  "  I  told  him  he'd  better  write. 
I  advised  it  strongly  ;  but  he  said  he  wa'n't  no  fist  at 
writin',  and  as  he  knew  I'd  had  exper'ence  he  put  the 
case  in  my  hands." 

Milly  had  now  suspended  her  work,  and  her  lips  be 
gan  to  quiver  slightly.  "  Oh,  I  see,  you  have  come  to 
make  a  bargain  between  me  and  Rastus — a  delicate  ne 
gotiation." 

"Jess  so,"  broke  in  Jake,  eagerly  forgetting  to  whis 
per.  "  You  know  Rastus  is  a  rich  man  ;  has  money  in 
bank,  and  twenty  head  of  fine  stock  on  the  place,  the 
very  best  critters  in  the  town." 

"  I  am  very  fond  of  critters,"  interposed  Milly,  whose 
back  was  shaking  a  little. 

"  I  knew  you  was,"  put  in  Jake  eagerly, <4  because  your 
head  is  level.  Then  you  know  all  about  the  farm — a 
sightly  place  and  so  well  watered.  Got  in  ten  acres  of 
winter  wheat  in  the  fall." 

"  Oh,  yes,  I  know  all  about  Paradise  Farm.  You  need 
not  go  into  an  inventory  of  crops  and  stock.  I  am  just 
in  love  with  the  farm." 

"  Glad  to  hear  you  say  so,"  returned  Jake  judicially. 
"  You  know  the  old  lady  can't  last  long,  and  if  any  thing 
should  happen  sudden-like  to  Rastus,  you  might  be  left 
a  widdy  with  a  snug  place." 

Milly  did  not  try  to  repress  her  laughter,  and  her  face 


3§  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

was  full  of  attractive  little  dimples.  "  There  is  nothing 
in  the  world  that  would  suit  me  better  than  to  be  left  a 
widdy  with  Paradise  Farm." 

"  I  thought  you  would  view  it  in  that  'ere  light.  1 
felt  sure  on  it  from  the  start.  So  I  s'pose  I  have  your 
leave  to  chirk  up  Rastus  a  bit." 

"  You  haven't  my  leave  to  do  any  thing  of  the  kind." 

"  Then  I  shall  tell  him  to  come  and  speak  up  for  his- 
self.  I  shall  report  what  you've  said  verboatim."  This 
was  a  word  Jake  had  picked  up  at  public  meetings,  and 
of  which  he  was  very  proud.  He  hung  about  Milly's 
shop  sometime  longer,  but  as  he  could  gather  no  more 
crumbs  of  comfort  for  Rastus,  he  finally  disappeared. 

The  interview  he  had  held  with  the  village  milliner 
was  the  result  of  a  great  many  interviews  with  Rastus 
in  the  barn,  and  behind  the  hay  stack,  and  down  by  the 
creek,  due  to  the  fermentation  of  ideas  set  up  in  Rastus's 
brain  the  previous  summer.  Rastus  had  confided  in 
Jake,  because  he  knew  he  was  experienced  in  affairs  of 
the  heart,  and  in  this  regard  Rastus  felt  himself  more 
out  of  his  element  than  when  he  had  been  a  captive  to 
the  Confederates  in  the  hen-house.  He  knew  Millyonly 
in  a  general  way,  as  all  villagers  know  each  other,  and 
had  often  heard  it  said  that  she  was  as  "  smart  as  chain 
lightnin'."  His  only  conception  of  smartness  in  a  woman 
was  of  the  kind  that  washes,  mends,  and  bakes  for  the 
stronger  sex.  He  had  perhaps  been  slyly  egged  on 
by  Hugh  (who  divined  what  was  brewing)  to  make  this 
perilous  venture. 

Rastus  allowed  a  day  or  two  to  elapse  after  hearing 
Jake's  report  of  Milly's  sweet  reasonableness  before 
making  trial  of  his  own  powers  as  a  lover.  She  had  been 
on  the  lookout  for  him,  and  when  he  came  was  rather 
grimly  pleased  at  the  idea  of  a  bit  of  fun.  Rastus  had 
put  on  his  best  clothes,  as  he  understood  courting  busi 
ness  always  demanded  this  kind  of  homage.  He  was 


X  AST  US    THINKS   Of''    GETTING  MARRIED.        39 

rather  high-colored,  and  his  mouth  had  more  of  a  tenden 
cy  to  stand  ajar  than  usual.  Milly's  perfect  self-possession 
was  very  upsetting  to  Rastus,  who  proceeded  to  forget 
every  thing  in  which  Jake  had  carefully  "  coached  "  him. 
She  looked  like  a  Sunday-school  teacher  who  is  receiving 
a  new  pupil,  and  is  prepared  to  give  him  a  wholesome  les 
son.  Rastus  fumbled  in  the  crown  of  his  hat,  and  a  pe 
culiar  embarrassed  grin  overspread  his  features  :  "  I 
suppose  Jake  has  told  you  what  I've  been  thinkin'  on." 

"  Oh,  yes,"  said  Milly  promptly.  "  Whatever  put  it 
into  your  head,  Rastus  ?  " 

Here  was  a  chance  for  a  pretty  speech,  one  of  those  he 
had  thought  over,  but  had  forgotten,  and  he  lapsed  into 
a  shocking  literalness.  "  You  see  mother  ain't  what  she 
was  ;  she  has  gone  deaf  and  her  hands  are  growin'  out  of 
j'int  with  rumatiz." 

"  Oh,  I  see,"  said  Milly  briskly.  "  You  will  have  to 
hire  help  in  the  house  unless  you  make  other  arrange 
ments." 

"  It's  natural  to  suppose,"  nodded  Rastus,  who  was 
getting  more  at  his  ease  as  the  conversation  took  a  strictly 
business  turn. 

"  What  work  did  your  mother  do  when  she  was  well 
and  strong  ?  " 

"  Well,  she  allus  milked  the  cows  and  made  butter, but 
now  her  hands " 

"  Oh,  of  course  ;  and  I  suppose  besides,  she  swept,  and 
washed,  and  made  beds,  and  cooked,  and  mended  your 
clothes  ? " 

"Yes,  mother  has  allus  kept  things  pretty  snug.  She's 
one  to  look  out  for  all  that's  goin'  on." 

"  Then  she  raises  chickens  and  turkeys,  and  sells  eggs, 
and  poultry,  and  butter  to  the  village  people.  You  would 
expect  your  wife  to  do  that  too  ?  " 

"  Natural  to  suppose, ".assented  Rastus  ;  and  then  he 
bethought  him,  and  pulled  himself  up  with  a  jerk — "  not 


40  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

unless  you  liked  it.  Some  folks  like  to  drive  'round  in 
the  fresh  air.  It's  real  healthy.  If  you  lived  up  at  the 
farm  you  might  live  to  be  ninety.  You  never  will,  here, 
shut  up  in  a  shop — good  air  and  water  on  the  farm,  the 
very  best." 

"  Oh,  yes,  I  know  all  that,"  murmured  Milly,  musing 
deeply,  "  but  I  was  thinking  what  I  should  get  for  all 
my  work.  It  would  be  your  society,  wouldn't  it,  as  you 
would  never  think  of  paying  wages  to  your  wife  ? " 

"  Natural  to  suppose,"  muttered  Rastus,  quite  losing 
his  head  again. 

Milly  got  up  and  faced  him  with  perfect  candor  and 
sweetness.  "  Well,  I  should  love  to  live  to  be  ninety,  and 
I  don't  mind  the  work  a  bit,  not  even  peddling  truck 
.around  the  village  ;  but  I  couldn't  endure  your  society 
all  those  years.  I'm  afraid  I  should  get  tired  of  your 
conversation,  especially  the  war  stories.  Therefore  I 
must  respectfully  decline,  with  thanks." 

"  But,"  stammered  Rastus,  "  you  encouraged  Jake 
Small." 

"  May  be  I  did  encourage  Jake,  but  I  haven't  encour 
aged  you.  But  I  shall  deal  with  your  mother,"  she  added, 
"just  the  same.  Don't  be  afraid  of  losing  my  custom." 
She  made  him  a  little  courtesy,  and  then  she  moved  to 
the  door,  opened  it,  and  shut  it  again  softly  behind  her. 

Rastus  stumbled  out  into  the  open  air,  and  Jake  was 
obliged  to  fight  quite  shy  of  him  for  several  weeks.  Milly 
never  told  the  story,  but  somehow  the  little  stone  house 
leaked,  and  it  was  presently  known  all  over  the  village. 

The  story  of  the  village  is  a  story  without  an  end.  It 
deals  with  the  homely  facts  of  life,  and,  unlike  the  novel, 
has  no  ulterior  aims  and  no  great  respect  for  the  literary 
unities.  There  is  never  a  pretense  made  of  bringing 
fascinating  people  together  solely  that  they  may  fall  in 
love,  marry,  and  live  forever  after  in  a  state  of  bliss. 
Love  is  an  episode,  always,  of  course,  the  most  interest* 


LIFE  IN    THE    VILLAGE.  4J 

ing  and  exciting  that  can  occur.  But  marriage  is  not 
the  be-all  and  end-all  of  a  considerable  section  of  village 
life.  There  are  several  of  both  sexes  who  do  not  marry, 
and  who  appear  to  get  along  about  as  well  as  their  mated 
neighbors.  They  have  fewer  cares,  and  they  are  not  a 
bit  more  given  to  gossip  than  other  people  ;  indeed  the 
greatest  gossip  in  the  village  is  a  blind  man  who  has 
reared  a  family  of  twelve  children. 

The  story  of  the  village  does  not  attempt  to  finish  all 
lives  with  a  round  turn.  It  recognizes  the  fact  that  most 
lives  remain  unfinished  and  are  deplorably  raveled  and 
ragged  at  the  edges.  Many  people  show  fine  romantic 
possibilities  which  never  come  to  any  thing,  and  yet  they 
are  not  blighted  beings.  They  visit  and  amuse  them 
selves,  and  read  books  and  magazines,  and  eat  and  sleep, 
just  as  if  they  never  had  been  nipped  by  an  untimely 
frost.  Village  life  is  hard,  like  all  life,  but  it  is  amelior 
ated  by  those  touches  of  humanity  which  make  us  all 
akin  ;  it  is  lubricated  by  that  divine  humor  which  plays 
like  lambent  flame  over  the  surface  of  existence.  The 
people  enjoy  the  privilege  of  social  criticism  in  select  cir 
cles.  They  enjoy  each  other  far  more,  I  think,  than  they 
would  if  they  were  all  perfect  characters.  For  it  must 
be  confessed  that  although  they  understand  the  value  of 
friendship,  they  also  tacitly  prize  their  spites  and  ani 
mosities.  There  is  nothing  that  will  keep  a  tough  old 
person  so  long  alive  as  avarice  and  a  neighborhood 
enmity.  The  asperities  come  in  to  help  as  well  as  the 
amenities,  with  that  blessed  feeling  that  one  is  superior 
in  virtue  to  some  other  folk.  If  you  get  to  the  point 
where  you  can  not  pay  your  debts,  then  you  are  accursed. 
Any  thing  else  of  a  venal  nature  may  in  time  perhaps  be 
forgiven.  Married  experience  is  not  altogether  a  ro 
mance  in  a  little  hamlet.  It  has  its  large,  sober,  practical 
aspects  and  its  absorbing  economic  side.  It  is  the  best 
way  devised  of  getting  on  in  a  difficult  world,  but  by  no 


42  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

means  ideal.  The  old  maids  talk  a  good  deal  about  the 
aesthetic  side  of  married  life,  and  the  true  way  to  bring 
up  children,  but  the  married  people  do  not  moralize  so 
much.  They  know  the  hard  facts  of  the  case.  They  try 
to  slip  along  between  uncompromising  conditions  with 
as  little  friction  and  heartache  as  possible.  Their  wis 
dom  is  embodied  in  trmt  excellent  practical  maxim, 
"  Make  the  best  of  things." 

There  are  not  many  of  the  purely  ornamental  kind  of 
women  in  the  village,  and  those  are  criticised  rather 
severely.  The  practical  feminine  virtues  are  still  held  to 
be  very  important.  Even  Mrs.  Judge  Magnus,  who  has 
figured  in  Washington  society,  puts  up  her  own  jelly  and 
jam,  and  is  a  notable  housekeeper.  To  be  sure  she 
keeps  two  or  three  maid-servants  and  a  man,  but  she  is  a 
bustling,  busy  kind  of  person,  with  sufficient  good  sense 
to  make  her  neighbors  feel  that  she  is  one  of  them,  and 
not  an  alien.  In  all  small  villages  there  is  a  certain  dis 
trust  of  strangers  and  strange  ways.  When  new  persons 
come  in  the  approaches  may  be  a  little  slow  unless  there 
is  a  good  introduction,  but  if  your  great-great-grand 
father  ever  lived  in  these  parts,  you  are  of  the  elect. 

The  village  man  most  honored  and  beloved  is  the  man 
very  good  to  his  "  women  folks,"  which  means  that  the 
women  run  over  him  and  have  their  own  unbridled  way. 
He  is  a  man  regular  at  his  meals,  who  doesn't  complain 
of  the  food,  and  talk  of  the  dishes  his  mother  used  to 
cook  when  he  was  a  boy,  even  if  the  steak  is  burned  and 
the  coffee  a  trifle  muddy.  If  he  would  be  truly  popular, 
he  must  be  easy  about  money  with  his  wife  and  his  girls, 
and  not  keep  the  purse-strings  too  tightly  drawn.  He 
does  not  make  any  unnecessary  work  about  the  house, 
but  is  nice  and  catlike  in  his  customs.  He  will  go  in  his 
stocking  feet  to  prevent  waking  his  wife  when  she  has  a 
headache,  and  he  thinks  of  the  extra  washing  when  he 
takes  out  a  clean  handkerchief.  He  must  above  all  things 


THE  DOMESTIC  IDEAL. 


\ 

43 


be  a  good  provider,  with  not  the  smallest  taint  of  slack 
ness  or  shiftlessness  clinging  to  his  skirts.  He  must 
have  a  nice  square  pile  of  wood  all  split  and  seasoned, 
and  a  fine  bin  of  coal  provided  against  the  cold  weather. 
His  ten  commandments  are  written  all  around  on  his 
fence,  his  garden-patch,  his  roof  and  chimneys.  He 
must  get  in  provisions  freely  by  the  bag  and  barrel,  and 
see  that  every  thing  is  done  that  can  be  done  to  make 
the  life  of  women  less  laborious.  Then  if  he  is  willing  to 
arise  at  night  and  walk  the  floor  several  hours  with  a 
fretful  teething  child,  he  is  considered  truly  angelic. 

In  the  household  where  there  is  no  servant  employed, 
the  man  who  will  allow  his  wife  to  get  up  in  the  morning 
and  build  the  kitchen  fire  is  not  looked  upon  as  much  of 
a  Christian.  He  may  write  fine  poetry  and  entertain  the 
most  beautiful  moral  sentiments,  he  may  even  pray  well 
in  the  weekly  meetings,  but  this  thing  is  always  spoken 
of  disparagingly  at  the  tea  "  fights  "  and  in  the  Dorcas 
Society,  where  \vomen  put  their  heads  close  together,  and 
talk  low  and  confidentially.  m  A  selfish  man  can  never 
hide  himself  from  censure  in  the  village.  He  is  known 
and  marked  for  condemnation.  A  shiftless  or  unprac 
tical  woman,  who  neglects  her  family,  is  also  open  to 
severe  criticism.  But  I  do  not  know  that  I  have  ever 
heard  a  woman  called  selfish  who  made  her  husband  wait 
on  her  and  the  children  to  an  unreasonable  degree.  It 
would  be  dangerous  to  admit  the  possibility  of  that  form 
of  feminine  selfishness,  and  it  never  has  been  admitted. 

One  of  the  former  village  saints  was  a  little,  slim,  pale 
minister  who  preached  here  at  one  time,  and  who  had  a 
bed-ridden  wife.  He  was  always  seen  when  out  of  the 
pulpit  carrying  an  air-pillow,  two  shawls,  and  a  hot- 
water  bottle.  It  was  well  known  that  his  constant  care 
of  his  wife,  who  suffered  from  an  inexplicable  nervous 
complaint,  had  made  him  quite  bald  before  the  age  of 
thirty-two.  Yet,  although  it  was  shrewdly  suspected  that 


44  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

this  complaint  was  at  least  partly  imaginary,  never  was  a 
word  spoken  concerning  the  selfishness  of  the  minister's 
wife.  I  may  add  that  some  years  later,  while  he  was 
preaching  in  a  neighboring  town,  the  parsonage  took  fire 
on  a  cold  winter  night,  and  the  invalid  lady,  who  had 
been  unable  to  do  more  than  walk  across  the  room  in  five 
years,  arose  in  her  fright,  and,  in  a  pair  of  slippers  and 
very  thin  garments,  ran  through  the  snow  for  half-a-mile. 
Since  that  time  she  has  been  a  perfectly  well  woman, 
doing  her  own  housework,  and  the  minister  has  grown  a 
new  and  fine  head  of  hair.  But  I  am  afraid  his  prestige 
as  a  moral  hero  is  somewhat  dimmed. 

The  doctor,  who  has  been  such  a  power  for  good  in 
the  community,  and  withal  so  open-handed  and  public- 
spirited  according  to  his  means,  is  a  masterful  person 
with  a  strong  will,  and  a  natural  tendency  to  domineer. 
The  neighbors  know  his  value,  but  they  suspect  that  his 
wife  is  a  little  too  meek,  a  little  too  much  given  to  that 
perfect  feminine  submissiveness  which,  though  enjoined 
by  Scripture,  is  not  the  village  ideal.  She  has  a  saintly 
face,  as  pure  as  a  snowflake,  and  almost  as  pale.  The 
silvery  hair  has  still  a  golden  sheen  and  is  puffed  at  the 
border  of  a  white  lace  cap  of  the  old  fashioned  variety. 
Her  dress  of  worn  black'silk  seems  never  renewed,  but 
has  an  indescribable  refinement  about  it  like  all  her  deli 
cate  belongings.  Her  voice,  with  its  soft,  low  intonation, 
and  her  rare  smile,  repel  all  undue  familiarity.  She 
finishes  the  pretty  tea-table  like  some  very  rare  family 
portrait — a  Sir  Joshua  or  a  Van  Dyck.  I  like  to  look  at 
her  in  church,  she  is  such  a  perfect  picture  of  a  time 
when  manners  were  more  ceremonious  and  courtly  than 
they  now  are.  The  neighbors  say  that  she  has  never 
dared  to  say  her  soul  is  her  own  in  the  household.  But 
she  is  intimate  with  only  a  few  of  them,  and  it  is  perhaps 
her  superiority  to  them  all  which  leads  them  to  try  and 
pick  a  flaw  in  her  character.  She  is  a  great  student  of 


THE   DOCTOR'S    }\rIFE.  45 

the  old  Bible,  and  has  found  much  comfort  in  the  most 
consoling  Psalms  and  the  beautiful  portions  of  Isaiah. 
She  holds  with  perfect  simplicity  and  true-heartedness  to 
the  religious  doctrines  of  her  youth  ;  and  even  Hugh, 
with  his  farrago  of  fantastic  notions,  is  alway  deferential 
in  her  presence. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

THE    W  R  E  N  S*     NEST. 

THE  range  of  farms  lying  in  close  order  form  a  rustic 
fringe  to  the  snugness  of  village  life.  The  place  is 
in  part  made  up  of  retired  farmers,  too  old  to  labor,  who 
have  left  the  homesteads  to  their  sons.  Thus  the  village 
tendrils  run  out  into  the  country  in  all  directions.  Mill 
Farm  lies  south,  and  is  one  of  the  most  picturesque 
places  anywhere  about.  The  old  mill,  with  its  flume  and 
water-wheel,  its  floury  interior,  its  humming  grinding- 
stones,  and  revolving  hopper,  is  joined  to  a  farm-house, 
with  a  flower  garden  in  the  half-inclosed  court,  and  at 
the  back  commands  a  view  of  the  wild  mill-brook  glen, 
where  picnic  parties  come  in  summer.  The  brook  feeds 
the  mill-wheel  and  falls  into  a  rocky  ravine  down  a  few 
gigantic  stone  steps.  In  the  freshets  of  spring  and 
autumn  it  becomes  a  charming  waterfall.  The  rocks 
below  the  fall  are  cushioned  with  brilliant  green  moss, 
kept  continually  fresh  by  the  spray  of  the  cascade.  The 
young  birches,  and  maples,  and  witch-hazels  which  lean 
over  the  water,  take  the  most  graceful  forms  in  the  deli 
cate  tracery  of  their  boughs.  There  are  two  or  three 
lower  pools,  where  the  trout  blink  in  lazy  motion  in  the 
sunlight  as  it  slants  down  the  dewy  wooded  bank,  and 
lights  up  the  very  heart  of  the  glen,  flickering  on  the 
moss  and  wet  stones,  and  the  purple  tree  trunks.  Now 
that  the  season  of  frost  has  come  the  mill-wheel  is  still  and 
the  fall  is  bearded  with  icicles — the  most  beautiful  frost 
work  is  gathered  on  stone  and  bush  and  tufted  moss, 


THE  GREAT  SYCAMORE.  47 

where  the  spray  has  frozen,  making  miniature  caves  with 
fairy  work  of  ferns,  and  grasses,  and  weeas  all  covered 
with  powdered  silver,  glittering  in  the  sun. 

On  the  road  to  the  flume,  as  this  ravine  is  called,  is  a 
stone  cottage,  low-browed,  with  broad  porches,  and  a 
huge  outside  chimney.  It  has  the  oldest  sycamore  tree 
in  the  town  standing  before  its  door — a  patriarch  among 
the  tribe  of  trees  ;  a  Methuselah  that  seems  to  have  lived 
a  thousand  years  ;  it  shades  the  whole  house  and  the 
front  yard,  and  throws  its  nourishing  summer  dews  over 
the  roof  into  the  kitchen  garden.  Every  body  in  the 
village  and  neighborhood  is  proud  of  this  tree.  It  is  one 
of  the  curiosities  of  the  place,  to  be  pointed  out  to 
strangers.  I  will  not  attempt  to  give  its  measurements. 
A  party  of  twelve  young  girls  once  tried  to  span  its  girth 
with  their  united  outstretched  hands,  and  it  is  suspected 
that  the  old  tree  was  as  joyful  over*  this  embrace  as  was 
Tennyson's  Talking  Oak  over  having  love  secrets  poured 
into  its  ears.  For  several  years  the  largest  limb  of  the 
old  sycamore  had  been  weak  and  decaying.  It  was 
bandaged  with  iron,  and  carefully  staid  with  a  kind  of 
framework  which  served  the  double  purpose  of  support 
and  rustic  summer-house.  The  three  maiden  sisters  who 
lived  in  the  cottage,  if  they  heard  a  noise  in  the  night, 
would  get  out  of  bed  to  see  if  any  thing  had  happened 
to  the  tree.  They  were  excellent  women,  who  had 
received,  I  suspect  from  Milly,  the  name  of  the  Three 
Wrens  ;  and  the  cottage  under  the  sycamore  was  known 
as  the  Wrens'  Nest. 

There  was  also  a  male  wren,  known  as  Brother,  who 
lived  in  this  snug  and  tidy  establishment  with  his  women- 
kind.  Morning,  noon,  and  night  the  conversation  of  the 
three  Wrens  turned  upon  Brother.  You  would  have  sup 
posed  to  hear  them  talk  of  the  way  he  slept  and  ate, 
and  from  the  account  of  his  habits,  that  he  was  a  weak 
ling,  and  chronic  invalid.  But,  on  the  contrary,  Brother 


4  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

was  a  large,  well-colored,  rather  fine-looking  man  who 
went  away  regularly  to  his  business  by  the  morning  train 
and  who  never  seemed  the  least  in  need  of  being  taken 
care  of  ;  still  he  was  taken  care  of  by  his  doting  sisters 
as  if  he  had  been  a  helpless  paralytic.  I  do  not  know 
whether  he  liked  so  much  attention  from  those  adoring 
females,  but  it  was  bliss  to  them  to  adore  ;  and  if  they  all 
could  have  been  taken  in  a  picture  kneeling  at  his  feet, 
it  would  have  fitly  expressed  the  way  in  which  he  was 
regarded  by  these  good  little  Wrens. 

His  room  at  the  Wrens'  Nest  was  a  perfect  museum  of 
masculine  comforts  and  luxuries.  It  was  reported  in  the 
village  that  he  slept  in  worked  bed-slippers  and  that 
certain  of  his  under  garments  were  ruffled  and  fluted. 
That  room  was  the  shrine  of  the  house,  a  place  the 
sisters  never  entered  irreverently.  They  took  turns, 
as  a  great  privilege,  in  doing  it  up  and  airing  the  mat 
tress.  The  bachelor  shrine  was  probably  the  prettiest 
bedroom  in  the  village,  for  the  Wrens  would  have  gone 
without  tea  rather  than  deprived  Brother  of  any  little 
charm  their  purses  could  buy  or  skillful  hands  devise.  It 
was  never  known  how  Brother  liked  it.  Hugh  threatened 
to  ask  him  whether  he  did  not  sometimes  kick  off  the 
crazy-quilt,  and  throw  the  worked  foot-stools  and  tidies 
out  of  the  window,  but  even  Hugh's  impudence  would 
not  carry  him  quite  so  far.  Brother  presumably  did  like 
it,  for  he  treated  his  good  sisters  with  great  respect,  and 
was  always  most  kind  and  attentive. 

One  night  in  spring  there  happened  to  be  a  terrible 
blow  from  the  north-east.  Brother  was  away  from  home 
on  business,  and  the  Wrens  scarcely  closed  an  eye  all 
night,  thinking  of  the  weak  limb  of  the  mighty  sycamore, 
which  was  groaning  and  laboring  so  piteously  in  the  blast. 
There  they  were  in  their  night-caps  peering  out  of  the 
chamber  window,  and  suffering  with  that  poor  dumb 
thing  which  had  thrown  its  protecting  shade  over  their 


THE    77FAVX  49 

whole  lives.  Before  morning  the  great  limb  came  down 
with  a  crash,  burying  the  front  yard  under  its  ruins  and 
just  missing  the  roof,  which  would  certainly  have  been 
crushed  beneath  its  massive  weight.  The  Wrens  wept  as 
they  thought  of  the  sad  welcome  Brother  would  receive, 
and  looked  at  the  dismantled  old  tree,  which,  now  shorn 
of  its  chief  ornament,  stoxl  up  gaunt  and  black  and 
wounded  in  the  morning  light.  Moreover,  they  regarded 
the  catastrophe  as  an  omen  of  trouble  to  come  to  their 
house.  They  set  down  the  day  and  hour  of  the  fall  in 
their  little  note-books  ;  and  the  story  goes  that  on  that 
day  the  widow  and  her  six  children  moved  into  the  vil 
lage.  But  this  important  event  did  actually  happen  a 
month  later. 

The  widow  was  the  niece  of  somebody  who  formerly 
had  lived  in  the  village,  and  in  her  girlhood  she  was  in 
the  habit  of  visiting  her  relative.  But  she  had  been  lost 
to  view  for  many  years,  now  appearing  on  the  scene  with 
six  small  children,  the  youngest  two  girl-twins  of  tender 
age.  She  had  married  a  good-looking  young  man  who 
turned  out  to  be  dishonest  and  bad  in  every  way  ;  and 
now  he  had  departed  to  another  world,  leaving  her  with 
naught  to  thank  him  for  but  a  very  flourishing,  healthy, 
handsome  family  of  little  ones.  As  she  sat  in  her  poor 
home  after  the  funeral,  dressed  in  her  scanty  mourning 
gown,  she  wept  bitterly,  not  because  of  the  demise  of  one 
who  had  caused  her  great  pain  and  humiliation,  but  from 
the  consciousness  that  there  was  scarce  a  dollar  in  her 
purse  and  but  small  store  of  food  in  the  house  to  feed  the' 
children.  The  loving  little  twins  crept  into  her  lap,  and 
clasped  their  arms  about  her  and  pressed  their  soft 
cheeks  to  hers,  and  administered  the  love  and  conso 
lation  that  come  from  baby  hands.  Neighbors  were 
kind,  and  within  a  few  weeks  remittances  began  to 
come  from  some  rich  relatives  at  a  distance  ;  and  finally 
the  widow  moved  to  the  village,  as  a  few  others  had 


5°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

done,  because  it  was  cheap  living  there  and  because  of 
the  library  and  the  high  school. 

The  advent  of  such  a  troop  of  bright-faced  children 
was  of  moment,  for  the  best  village  people  do  not  have 
large  families  now.  The  time  grandames  tell  of.  when 
the  old  district  school  was  in  existence,  and  the  eldest 
child  of  a  family  was  expected  to  shout  out  the  number 
of  his  brothers  and  sisters  present  at  roll-call,  has  passed 
away.  Then  one  of  the  Stockton  tribe  often  sang  out 
"  Thirteen  "  ;  but  the  Stocktons  are  no  longer  found  in 
the  village.  Many  houses  have  no  children  ;  some,  like 
the  doctor's,  have  a  grandchild,  or  a  nephew,  or  a  niece  ; 
a  few  quite  poor  people,  like  Jake  Small,  are  blessed 
with  a  quiver  full.  The  pair  of  twins,  called  respectively 
Goody  Twoshoes  and  Baby  No  One — why,  I  am  sure  I 
do  not  know — became  very  popular.  They  were  lovely 
little  Kate  Greenaway  creatures,  so  exactly  alike  that  no 
one  but  the  mother  could  tell  them  apart  when  they  slept. 
Their  frocks  and  sun-bonnets  and  worn  shoes  had  a 
touch  of  something  idyllic.  They  were  much  given  to 
running  away,  when  they  would  fall  captive  to  some 
childless  woman  and  be  carried  into  her  house  and  fed 
and  entertained  with  playthings  for  hours.  The  mother, 
with  six  to  feed  and  clothe,  and  only  one  pair  of  hands 
to  do  every  thing,  was  often  obliged  to  let  the  twins  run 
wild.  Goody  Twoshoes  was  the  most  enterprising  and 
adventurous,  but  Baby  No  One  always  followed  where 
Goody  led,  and  copied  her  sister  in  every  thing.  Hand 
in  hand,  chuckling  in  their  dear  little  hearts,  and  ripe  for 
mischief,  they  slipped  out  of  the  back  door  and  were  off 
down  the  road  as  fast  as  their  winged  feet  could  carry 
them.  Several  times  they  had  been  picked  up  a  consid 
erable  distance  from  home  by  the  butcher  who  distributes 
meat  to  the  villagers  daily,  and  once,  to  their  infinite  de 
light,  they  came  home  in  the  band  wagon  of  a  circus. 
But  no  harm  ever  came  to  the  twins.  They  were  in  a 


A    PLA  V   GARDEN.  51 

measure  adopted  by  the  whole  village.  The  doctor  often 
took  them  in  his  wagon  when  he  went  on  his  round  of 
visits,  and  young  men  and  boys  swung  them  on  gates  and 
carried  them  off  on  the  most  delightful  excursions,  and 
altogether  they  had  a  jolly  good  time  and  were  veritable 
sovereigns  of  the  place. 

The  mother,  I  should  have  said,  was  a  remarkably 
pretty  woman,  in  spite  of  her  many  cares  and  troubles, 
and  now  that  the  little  sums  came  quite  regularly  from 
her  rich  relations,  the  roses  began  to  blossom  in  her 
cheeks.  She  was  at  work  at  the  sewing  machine  from 
morning  till  night,  making  and  mending  for  those  six  lit 
tle  ones,  but  still  the  roses  would  begin  to  blossom  again. 
It  was  a  long  time  before  Brother  made  her  acquaint 
ance  ;  indeed,  he  hardly  knew  of  her  existence  until  one 
lovely  June  day  he  encountered  the  twins  in  a  shady  lane 
not  far  from  his  own  house.  They  had  gone  in  a  very 
naughty  way  and  pulled  Marcella  Hildreth's  finest  roses, 
superb  Jacqueminots  and  Marechal  Neils  she  was  saving 
for  the  flower  show,  and  had  gathered  a  great  quantity 
of  ox-eyed  daisies  and  buttercups  by  the  wayside,  and 
were  planting  them  all  out  together  in  a  little  garden 
made  of  soft  brown  dirt  just  in  the  middle  of  the  road. 
They  had  brought  water  in  plantain  leaves  from  a 
brooklet  close  at  hand,  a  few  drops  at  a  time,  mostly 
spilled  upon  their  pinafores,  already  much  soiled  with  the 
soft  earth.  They  had  stuck  in  all  the  roses  and  the 
weeds  together,  and  were  patting  down  the  ground  with 
their  four  little  hands,  and  looking  like  very  industrious 
golden-headed  chicks.  They  were  quite  fluffy  and 
heated,  with  locks  of  hair  hanging  in  their  eyes  and  their 
sun-bonnets  bobbing  sociably  together. 

It  was  thus  that  Brother  found  them,  naughty  and 
soiled,  but  O,  so  lovely.  He  came  upon  the  scene  just 
in  time  to  save  them  from  the  dreadful  consequences  of 
the  wrath  of  Miss  Marcella,  who,  discovering  her  loss, 


5  2  I7  ILL  AGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

had  come  forth  to  seek  the  culprits  in  the  spirit  of  an 
avenging  Nemesis.  I  know  not  what  would  have  hap 
pened  had  not  Brother  arrived  on  the  scene  to  shelter 
the  two  little  miscreants  in  his  arms.  He  carried  them 
all  the  way  home,  and  handed  them  to  the  grateful  widow 
over  the  front  gate.  He  must  have  noticed  then  and 
there  that  the  widow's  pretty  forehead  was  corrugated 
just  in  the  middle  by  three  little  anxious  lines.  Being  a 
benevolent  man,  the  desire  may  have  arisen  in  him  to 
smooth  away  those  tiny  wrinkles.  At  any  rate  it  appeared 
soon  after  this  encounter  that  Brother  had  less  urgent 
business  abroad,  or  his  summer  vacation  may  have  fallen 
at  this  time,  for  he  was  often  seen  in  the  neighborhood 
of  the  widow's  cottage.  He  sometimes  invited  the  twins, 
with  whom  he  had  fallen  in  love,  to  drive  out  with  him, 
and  of  course  the  mother  was  obliged  to  accompany  her 
darlings.  It  dawned  upon  him  at  last  that  in  order  to 
possess  the  twins  he  must  marry  the  widow  and  the  other 
four,  and  in  spite  of  the  prayers  and  remonstrances  of 
the  Wrens,  his  sisters,  who  had  devoted  their  lives  to 
making  him  selfish,  and  gloried  in  their  work,  the  inev 
itable  was  accomplished. 

The  poor  Wrens  have  always  attributed  their  misfor 
tune  to  the  broken  limb  of  the  great  sycamore.  If  this 
had  not  happened  the  widow  would  never  have  had 
power  to  cast  her  spell  about  Brother.  They  have  done 
just  what  they  always  said  they  would  do  if  Brother  ever 
married.  They  have  moved  out  of  the  cottage,  taking 
their  personal  belongings  with  them,  and  have  departed 
on  the  railway,  with  veils  down  and  handkerchiefs  pressed 
to  their  eyes.  The  thought  of  giving  up  Brother  to  one 
was  intolerable  ;  but  now  that  he  has  married  a  family  of 
seven,  the  case  is  one  of  unparalleled  atrocity. 

Brother,  though  he  looks  a  little  older,  seems  to  take 
kindly  to  family  cares.  He  drives  a  smart  little  bay 
horse  harnessed  to  a  two-seated  buggy,  which  he  had 


BROTHER'S  SHRINE.  53 

•» 

made  on  purpose  to  accommodate  himself  and  the  three 
Wrens.  You  may  see  him  almost  any  day  driving  about, 
with  the  twins  on  the  front  seat,  and  the  other  four 
packed  indiscriminately  in  the  back  of  the  wagon.  As 
to  Brother's  shrine,  1  leave  you  to  imagine  what  has 
happened  to  the  crazy-quilts  and  the  foot-warmers,  and 
the  embroidered  stools  and  cushions.  A  certain  pathos 
clings  to  their  memory. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

A    MORMON     SETTLEMENT.— STEPHEN     LOSES    HIS    MONEY. 

I^HE  shortest  days  have  come,  and  the  darkest, 
those  days  when  it  requires  some  active  faith 
to  believe  the  world  will  ever  emerge  from  its  own 
shadow.  If  ghosts  ever  walk,  it  must  be  now,  when 
"  chaos  and  old  night  "  seem  to  have  things  all  their  own 
way,  and  the  belated  sun  comes  laggingly  over  the 
frozen  shoulders  of  Saddleback  at  an  unseemly  hour  in 
the  morning,  and  with  a  faint,  pale  gleam,  as  if  half  in 
clined  to  turn  in  again  to  his  warm  bed  in  those  blessed 
islands  where  his  steeds  are  stabled  over  night.  The  new 
daylight  lies  bleak  along  the  village  highways,  and  makes 
the  old  houses  look  more  gray  and  gaunt  than  ever,  and 
lights  the  piles  of  snow  with  a  hopeless  kind  of  glimmer, 
as  if  the  task  of  dissolving  them  were  entirely  out  of  its 
power.  The  scene  is  desolate  in  spite  of  the  snugness  of 
many  trees,  and  the  effort  made  by  door-yard  evergreens 
to  keep  a  spark  of  hope  alive  in  the  numb  breast  of  the 
vegetable  world.  Sad  winds  blow  at  night,  bringing 
bodeful  creakings  out  of  the  old  elms,  which  whistle,  and 
whine,  and  sob  as  if  living  creatures  were  whipped  by 
the  blast.  The  huntsman  of  the  German  forests  clatters 
with  his  troop  over  our  Puritan  village  roofs.  Old  doors 
and  windows  are  dismally  rheumatic  on  such  nights,  and 
groan  piteously  in  all  their  joints.  Spirits  jabber,  and 
mutter,  and  laugh  down  the  big  chimneys,  and  bang  the 
window-shutters.  Sick  people  lie  and  listen  with  vague 
foreboding,  and  children  tuck  their  heads  under  the  cov 
erlid.  * 


COASTING.  55 

No  healthy  person  here  suffers  from  the  cold.  Fuel  is 
cheap,  and  people  would  be  horrified  at  the  thought  of 
actual  need.  Even  old  Betty  Speer  and  Jake  Small  are 
perfectly  snug  in  their  poor  houses,  and  there  are  people 
who  save  cats'  meat  for  Betty's  two  felines,  Arnica  and 
Malaria,  to  whom  Betty  gave  these  titles  because  "  they 
are  real  pretty  soundin'  and  she  don't  care  what  they 
mean."  Several  of  the  village  homes  are  luxuriously 
warm.  They  have  double  sashes,  and  portieres  and  thick 
rugs  and  big  open  fires,  as  well  as  furnaces  and  heaters. 
Mrs.  Judge  Magnus  preserves  a  summer  warmth  through 
out  her  large  mansion.  The  conservatory  is  full  of  bloom 
ing  plants,  and  the  rooms  wear  a  delightful  aspect  of  wel 
come  and  good  will.  Houses  have  faces  like  people,  and 
this  house  is  always  smiling  out  of  its  large  windows 
which  glow  with  crimson  curtains. 

The  boys  collect  with  their  sleds  on  Pudding  Knoll 
with  perfect  indifference  to  the  cold.  If  the  mercury 
drops  20°  below  zero,  so  much  the  better  for  them. 
Some  of  the  little  fellows  have  their  ears  bound  up  in 
mufflers  and  handkerchiefs.  They  stamp  their  feet  and 
clap  their  mittened  hands,  and  try  to  talk  big  as  if  their 
voices  had  already  changed.  Their  trowsers  are  tied  at 
the  bottom  with  string,  which  indicates  that  they  are 
prepared  for  serious  business.  The  slide  on  Pudding 
Knoll  is  almost  ideally  perfect,  starting  from  a  small 
clump  of  trees  on  top  of  the  knoll,  and  running  down  the 
smooth  side  of  the  hill  free  from  snags,  until  at  the  foot 
it  strikes  a  little  duck  pond  of  smooth  glare  ice.  Across 
this  the  sleds  glide  until  they  touch  the  opposite  shore 
and  the  momentum  is  spent.  The  boys  grow  red  to 
the  tips  of  their  ears  as  the  fun  waxes  fast  and 
furious.  They  tug  uphill  their  own  sleds,  and  perhaps 
a  girl's  besides,  for  there  are  plenty  of  girls  on  hand, 
though  sometimes  they  are  not  wanted,  and  are 
simply  endured  as  a  necessary  evil  in  a  difficult  world. 


5 6  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

The  larger  boys  have  to  tolerate  the  girls,  to  take 
a  kind  of  grudging  care  of  them,  and  to  give  them  bits 
of  rides.  After  all,  they  are  not  as  exasperating  as  the 
smallest  boys,  little  tots  all  done  up  like  round  dumplings 
by  the  hands  of  careful  mammas.  They  have  all  brought 
something  to  eat  in  their  pockets,  which  gives  them  a 
peculiarly  bulgy  and  amorphous  appearance.  These  ambi 
tious  infants  are  apt  to  cry  and  get  babyish  when  they 
hurt  themselves,  and  they  often  have  to  be  dragged  up 
hill.  They  have  also  a  "  nasty  "  fashion  of  tying  their 
miserable  little  sleds,  named  "  Blue  Bird  "  or  "  Robin 
Redbreast,"  in  a  sly  way  to  the  tail  of  a  big  bob-sled, 
thus  adding  a  samll  boy  accompaniment  to  the  more  ex 
clusive  fun  of  their  elders  and  betters.  Besides,  these 
small  boys  are  apt  to  tell  tales  at  home  of  the  way  they 
have  been  abused  on  Pudding  Knoll,  at  the  same  time 
showing  their  wounds,  and  then  there  is  what  the  big 
fellows  call  a  "  row."  But  in  spite  of  persecution  and 
hindrance  of  this  nature,  owing  to  the  absurd  need  there 
seems  to  be  for  the  existence  of  girls  and  small  brothers 
who  will  "  tag,"  the  big  boys  still  do  have  a  glorious 
time  on  that  beautiful  little  knoll.  Of  course  they  never 
look  at  the  far-stretching  landscape,  with  Saddleback  in 
the  distance,  shading  to  a  soft  blue  and  purple,  and  the 
whole  valley  ready  to  tell  its  story  to  a  seeing  eye,  if  there 
should  chance  to  be  one.  But  the  air  is  delicious,  and 
exercise  even  in  these  bitter  days  in  a  nipping  wind  sets 
the  blood  dancing  in  the  veins  and  the  heart  beating  to 
a  merry  tune. 

Unfortunately  youth  and  its  tastes  and  pleasures  last 
but  a  short  time.  There  are  not  many  in  the  village  who 
care  greatly  for  outdoor  exercise  or  for  the  beauties  of 
nature.  The  lovely  setting  of  the  little  town  has  its 
effect  on  them.  They  are  proud  to  hear  strangers  praise 
it ;  but  most  elderly  people  live  indoors,  and  know  not 
that  winter  has  its  charms.  The  hard,  grim  facts  of  our 


A    MORMON   SETTLEMENT.  57 

New  England  life  produced  a  stern  type  Of  Puritanism, 
which,  though  much  effaced  about  the  edges,  still  has  an 
undissolved  core.  When  people  endure  much  hardness 
they  naturally  come  to  believe  in  an  inexorable  and 
limited  God  and  a  pitiless  fate.  With  better  circum 
stances  God  grows  more  loving,  and  the  doctrines  of 
election  and  predestination  loosen  their  grip.  This  pro 
cess  has  been  going  on  a  good  many  years,  and  has  led 
to  interesting  results.  Here  in  the  village  you  may  study 
in  small  the  whole  religious  history  of  the  land,  and 
mark  how  "  isms  "  and  strange  doctrines  have  arisen  and 
faded.  Even  in  times  when  people  found  comfort  in  an 
angry  God  and  a  lurid  background  of  condemnation,  the 
crotchety  eccentric  spirit  lived  here,  and  brought  forth 
ideas  which  have  shocked  or  softened  the  religious  sensi 
bilities  of  the  place. 

The  village  is  not  more  prolific  of  these  new  lights  than 
other  places,  yet  we  have  had  a  number  of  Second  Ad- 
ventists,  Spiritualists,  Mind  and  Faith  Healers,  and  other 
independent  thinkers.  Many  years  ago  a  small  company 
of  Mormons  lived  in  some  detached  tenements  about  a 
mile  from  the  place,  on  the  old  plank  road.  No  one 
knew  whence  they  came  or  why  they  did  not  at  once 
move  on  to  Utah.  They  were  always  talking  of  their 
land  of  Canaan,  but  still  they  lingered,  and  in  spite  of 
their  faith  were  respected  as  peaceable  and  upright  citi 
zens.  They  were  forever  on  the  point  of  departure,  with 
their  loins  girt  about  and  their  lamps  trimmed  and  burn 
ing,  but  the  money  to  transport  them  to  Brigham  Young's 
paradise  seemed  a  long  time  on  the  road.  Occasionally  an 
apostle  came  among  them,  and  then  a  great  preaching  and 
exhorting  was  held.  Some  of  the  village  children  would 
steal  into  the  conventicle  in  the  hope  of  hearing  or  seeing 
something  extraordinary.  It  was  rumored  that  "  Mis'  " 
Hys-ope,  one  of  the  Mormon  women  of  the  neighborhood, 
could  speak  with  tongues  ;  and  she  was  looked  upon 


58  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

with  a  certain  awe  by  the  children,  though  in  fact  she 
was  a  rather  untidy,  red-haired  woman,  always  carrying 
about  a  heavy  baby  in  her  arms.  One  day  little  Harry 
Holt,  who  had  run  away  from  home  to  the  Mormon 
meeting,  came  back  with  his  eyes  very  large  and  in  a 
high  state  of  excitement. 

"  Oh,  mother,"  he  exclaimed,  "  the  vials  is  going  to  be 
poured  out." 

"  The  what  ?"  asked  his  mother,  naturally  thinking  of 
her  medicine  bottles. 

"  The  vials  of  wrath  is  all  going  to  be  poured  out  on 
the  heads  of  us  Gentiles.  Mis'  Hyslope  says  so  ;  and 
she  danced  right  up  and  down  in  the  middle  of  the 
floor." 

The  vials  were  poured  out  on  the  head  of  poor  Harry, 
for  running  away  and  disobeying  orders,  but  that  was  all 
that  came  of  Mis'  Hyslope's  dreadful  prophecy.  The 
Hyslope  family  had  one  beautiful  child,  a  little  girl  named 
Jane,  very  gentle  and  lovely  to  look  upon,  with  large 
blue  eyes  and  the  most  perfect  curling  golden  hair. 
Jenny  was  a  great  favorite  with  the  neighbors,  and  just 
before  all  the  Mormons  in  the  village  received  the  word 
of  command  to  march  to  Utah  she  sickened  and  died. 
Her  little  grave  was  made  close  to  the  roadside  in  an 
open  field,  as  the  bigoted  father  did  not  wish  to  lay  her 
body  among  the  bones  of  the  unbelieving.  When  her 
people  marched  away  there  was  nothing  left  to  speak  of 
them  but  the  little  grass-grown  grave  with  its  rude  head 
stone.  But  the  tradition  of  Jenny  Hyslope's  loveliness 
has  lingered  in  the  neighborhood,  and  up  to  this  time, 
though  her  very  name  is  forgotten,  the  school  children 
are  accustomed  in  spring-time  to  lay  flowers  on  the 
"  Mormon  girl's  "  grave. 

Even  in  these  days  of  relaxed  discipline  there  are  vil 
lage  lines  dividing  the  goats  from  the  sheep.  Every 
family  takes  a  religious  newspaper,  and  nowadays  all 


RELIGIOUS  NEWSPAPo 

shades  of  theology  are  taught  by  the  reTt^ous.  press. 
Some  of  the  more  attractive  papers,  well  filled  with  pic 
tures,  stories,  and  secular  items,  meet  with  a  good  deal 
of  favor,  but  they  are  not  looked  upon  as  quite  sound. 
To  be  both  safe  and  sound  a  paper  must  be  rather  dull 
and  absolutely  untainted  in  its  doctrine.  As  Deacon 
Hildreth's  wife  says  :  "  You  want  something  to  tie  to  in 
a  newspaper,  and  a  good  many  that  look  attractive  are 
theologically  as  slippery  as  eels."  The  village  families 
who  take  the  Watch  Tower  and  who  swear  by  it  are  con 
sidered  a  little  more  respectable  than  some  others  who 
have  run  off  on  to  side  tracks  in  regard  to  their  Sunday 
reading.  The  Watch  Tower  has  gone  on  in  one  straight 
groove  for  fifty  or  sixty  years,  never  veering  to  the  right 
or  left.  All  its  little  stories  and  its  editorials  are  of  one 
piece.  Some  of  the  old  families  have  in  their  garrets  files 
of  the  Watch  Tower  going  back  to  the  first  number  issued. 
They  are  like  so  much  good  doctrine  stacked  and  corded 
for  winter  use.  When  a  village  boy  goes  wrong  it  is  very 
apt  to  be  said  that  he  was  brought  up  on  the  Brazen 
Trumpet  or  the  Religious  Chromo,  and  then  every  thing  is 
explained.  Laxity  of  doctrine,  it  is  thought,  has  crept 
in  with  ihe.C/irvmo  to  an  alarming  degree  ;  but  it  is  so 
bright,  newsy,  and  sparkling  it  gains  the  largest  number 
of  subscribers,  and  there  is  a  painful  rumor  that  Mrs. 
Deacon  Hildreth  has  been  caught  reading  it  in  the  back 
kitchen  when  she  thought  "  folks  "  were  not  'round. 

I  am  fain  to  confess  that  many  of  the  best  people  in  the 
village  were  educated  by  the  Watch  Tower,  but  of  course 
there  are  exceptions  to  every  rule.  Stephen  imbibed  its 
doctrines  with  his  mother's  milk.  His  parents  were  very 
careful  to  exclude  all  kinds  of  doubtful  literature  from 
their  only  son.  But  Stephen  soon  took  matters  in  his 
own  hands ;  and  has  been  more  or  less  perturbed  in  his 
orbit  by  the  motions  of  other  heavenly  bodies.  Stephen 
is  eccentric,  but  there  is  no  danger  of  his  ever  going 


60  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

wrong  unless  spite  and  malice  should  overcome  his  pru 
dence.  Did  such  danger  exist,  there  would  be  more  hope 
of  him.  He  is  so  shut  up  in  conceit  of  himself  and  his 
own  virtue  that  I  do  not  suppose  any  least  little  sin  will 
ever  penetrate  his  coat  of  mail  to  bring  him  to  a  better 
frame  of  mind.  He  goes  about  preaching  abstinence 
to  people  who  are  already  too  abstinent,  and  have  never 
in  their  lives  taken  any  thing  stronger  than  a  glass  of  old 
cider.  He  has  opinions  on  all  subjects,  and  he  thrusts 
them  in  with  his  raucous  voice  where  old  and  wise  people 
would  fain  be  silent.  He  is  an  extreme  example  of  the 
ill-effects  of  a  small  neighborhood  on  a  narrow,  sharp,  and 
acute  mind. 

Stephen  is  very  clever.  He  has  studied  the  birds  of 
the  vicinity,  and  made  a  collection,  which  you  may  see  in 
a  large  glass  cabinet  in  his  mother's  parlor,  worthy  of  a 
skilled  taxidermist.  He  has  corresponded  with  learned 
societies,  and  written  articles  for  scientific  papers  ;  and 
probably  the  only  two  men  in  the  village  you  would  ever 
hear  spoken  of  at  a  distance  are  Judge  Magnus  and 
Stephen.  But  some  people  dwindle  perceptibly  as  you 
draw  near  their  homes.  The  judge's  good  opinion  of 
himself  is  an  exuberant,  interior  satisfaction,  and  an  ami 
able  desire  to  patronize  all  the  world.  It  can  be  endured, 
and  almost  liked.  But  people  wish  to  run  away  from 
Stephen  as  from  a  pest.  His  irritable  mind  stirs  up  the 
most  peaceable  to  an  indignant  protest.  He  tackles  most 
indecently  quiet  folks  who  just  wish  to  be  let  alone  to 
serve  God,  and  do  their  duty  in  the  walk  in  life  to  which 
they  have  been  called. 

The  weekly  prayer-meeting  is  open  to  every  body,  and 
it  is  considered  an  excellent  sign  of  spiritual  awakening 
when  a  young  man  or  maiden  is  willing  to  take  a  part. 
At  one  time  Stephen  invaded  the  prayer-meeting  regu 
larly  every  Wednesday  night,  and  if  he  had  carried  a 
hornets'  nest  into  its  subdued  atmosphere,  he  could  not 


STEPHEN'S    THEOLOGY.  61 

have  created  a  greater  commotion.  He  holds  literally  to 
the  doctrines  of  the  burning  lake  of  Gehenna,  and  of 
election  and  predestination,  tenets  which  some  of  the  best 
Christian  people  have  blinked  for  a  long  time,  feeling 
that  it  is  well  to  play  the  part  of  the  ostrich  and  hide  one's 
head  in  the  sand  when  such  disagreeable  questions  are 
uppermost.  But  Stephen  never  blinks  any  thing  ;  he 
comes  out  with  a  sharply  defined  literalism  quite  shock 
ing  to  sensitive  minds,  and  yet  not  all  of  his  doctrines  are 
of  the  most  strict  sect.  Mixed  up  with  extreme  "  ortho 
dox  "  views  are  notions  he  has  picked  up  or  evolved  from 
his  own  consciousness,  such  as  the  idea  that  all  souls  are 
not  immortal — that  through  extremity  of  sin  some  may 
perish  utterly.  These  things  he  proclaimed  in  a  brazen 
manner  at  the  meetings  until  the  old  people,  who  mainly 
resort  there  for  an  hour  of  spiritual  repose  and  medita 
tion,  were  driven  nearly  wild  by  his  fluent,  rasping 
talk,  which  came  under  the  head  of  "  giving  experience." 
Old  Miss  Withers,  who  in  her  way  is  almost  as  eccentric 
as  Stephen,  rose  from  her  seat  very  angry  one  evening, 
and  with  her  face  quite  scarlet,  said  in  a  shrill,  piping 
voice  :  "  Ef  you  think  you  can  teach  folks  twice  your 
age,  and  cram  things  offered  to  idols  right  down  their 
throats,  why  don't  you  move  to  a  bigger  place  ? "  Then 
she  sat  down  fanni-ng  herself  hysterically,  and  Stephen 
answered  with  solemn  sententiousness  :  "  Because  I  think 
the  village  needs  me."  There  was  a  ripple  of  laughter 
all  over  the  room,  and  Deacon  Hildreth  was  obliged  to 
dismiss  the  meeting. 

At  one  time  Stephen  took  up  violently  against  banks. 
Consequently  he  took  to  hoarding  his  money  at  home. 
By  trade  he  is  a  cabinetmaker,  and  one  of  the  best.  His 
manual  dexterity  is  such  if  he  had  the  poetic  feeling  he 
would  be  an  artist.  The  summer  boarders  have  bought 
a  great  many  of  the  little  writing-desks  which  he  makes 
of  native  woods,  and  at  the  time  of  which  I  speak 


62  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

Stephen  had  hoarded  two  hundred  and  fifty  dollars.  As 
he  would  not  patronize  a  bank,  he  looked  about  anxiously 
at  home  to  see  where  he  could  place  his  funds  in  safe 
keeping,  and  finally  he  hid  the  money  in  the  watch- 
pocket  of  an  old  pair  of  trowsers,  which  he  hung  behind 
some  lumber  in  the  garret.  Stephen  did  not  mention  the 
matter  to  his  mother,  but  kept  the  secret  locked  in  his 
own  heart.  To  tell  the  truth,  his  mother  is  afraid  of  him. 
Naturally,  she  would  be  a  gossiping,  lively,  kind-hearted 
old  lady,  but  her  child  has  forced  her  into  a  home-stay 
ing,  brooding  sort  of  person,  who  is  .always  on  the  look 
out  in  a  furtive  way  for  the  opportunity  to  do  little  deeds 
of  kindness  without  being  detected.  Stephen  does  not 
believe  in  feeding  the  hungry  or  clothing  the  naked.  He 
is  one  of  those  horrid  economists  who  carry  out  their 
principles  to  the  letter,  and  can  not  be  made  to  feel  that 
any  form  of  human  misery  is  undeserved.  But  his  mother 
is  made  up  quite  differently.  It  would  pain  her  dear  old 
heart  to  have  any  being,  however  unworthy,  gnawed  by 
the  pangs  of  hunger.  She  has,  I  fear,  helped  to  fill  the 
alms-houses  and  inebriate  asylums  by  giving  away  part 
of  her  slender  income  to  tramps. 

Stephen  having  the  smallest  opinion  of  his  mother's 
mental  capacity,  had  refrained  from  telling  her  where  he 
had  hidden  his  cash.  One  day  a  poor  man  with  his 
draggled  wife  came  begging  to  the  back  door.  He  was 
suspiciously  red  in  the  nose  and  watery  about  the  eyes, 
but  his  clothes  were  miserably  poor  and  thin,  and  the 
day  was  cold,  and  the  woman  told  a  piteous  tale.  Ste 
phen's  mother,  therefore,  actually  with  tears  in  her  eyes, 
trotted  up  to  the  garret  and  pulled  out  an  old  gown  of 
her  own,  and  then  rummaged  about  until  she  laid  hands 
on  that  identical  pair  of  old  trowsers  under  the  lumber- 
pile  which  her  son  had  so  carefully  concealed.  Well,  the 
result,  though  fearful,  was  unexpected.  Stephen  treated 
his  mother  so  abominably  that  she  roused  herself  to  con- 


STEPHEN    LOSES  HfS  MOVEY.  63 

front  him,  and  for  a  time  was  far  less  meek  and  timid 
than  before  the  event  occurred.  The  villagers,  I  must 
confess,  were  all  secretly  glad.  The  sheriff  got  out  a 
posse  and  raised  a  hue  and  cry,  but  the  two  tramps  had 
utterly  disappeared  before  the  loss  was  discovered. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

THE    HON.    HIGHFLYER    VISITS    THE    VILLAGE. 

HUGH  has  now  concluded  to  write  a  history  of  the 
town — an  employment  for  which  his  talents  and 
attainments  are  admirably  fitted — and  to  leave  the  com 
position  of  the  great  American  novel  to  a  future  day. 
He  has  made  local  research  the  excuse  for  invading  most 
of  the  village  homes  and  prying  into  old  trunks,  escri 
toires,  and  bureaus  where  yellow  documents  lie  concealed. 
He  is  more  troublesome  than  the  book-agent  or  the 
lightning-rod  man,  but  then  he  is  far  more  insinuating 
and  persuasive  ;  and  it  is  quite  a  picture  to  see  him  at 
the  village  tea-tables,  discoursing  about  the  ancestors  of 
the  family.  There  is  scarce  an  old  love-letter  in  the 
place  into  which  he  has  not  taken  a  peep,  and  he  has 
gathered  up  odd  bits  of  domestic  history  sufficient  to 
make  a  volume,  a  vast  amount  of  rubbish  out  of  which 
he  hopes  to  extract  a  few  grains  of  gold. 

His  antiquarian  research  has  been  the  pretext  for  hob 
nobbing  with  all  the  old  maids  and  flattering  all  the  old 
ladies  in  the  town.  He  has  brought  each  one  round  to 
the  belief  that  she  is  descended  from  a  famous  old  En 
glish  family,  with  nothing  less  than  a  baronial  seat,  dating 
back  to  the  Crusades,  or  possibly  as  far  as  the  Norman 
Conquest.  He  has  even  hinted  at  sums  of  money  in  chan 
cery  to  which  some  of  them  may  be  entitled  ;  and  has 
thoroughly  stirred  up  that  pride  in  descent  from  a  long- 
lived  and  distinguished  race  and  that  greed  of  inherit 
ance  which  is  latent  in  us  all.  You  should  see  Hugh  in 
confidential  confab  with  some  ancient  dame  who  has 


HUGH'S  RESEARCHES.  65 

little  left  to  her  but  family  pretensions  and  cracked 
china,  going  over  all  her  bits  of  things  with  solemn  seri 
ousness,  and  delivering  a  lecture  on  ceramics,  to  which 
she  listens  as  if  it  were  law  and  gospel.  There  is  not  an 
old  cabinet,  or  spinning-wheel,  or  chest  of  drawers,  or 
colonial  clock,  or  brass  warming-pan,  which  Hugh  has 
not  taken  in  hand  and  descanted  on  profoundly  to  the 
delight  of  the  owner. 

All  this  rummaging  and  tea-drinking  is  in  the  interest 
of  the  town  history  which  is  to  place  a  halo  of  light  about 
our  hamlet,  and  let  the  world  know  the  great  number  of 
distinguished  families  it  contains.  The  town  has  no  par 
ticular  history,  being  of  that  Arcadian  sort  that  nothing 
of  note  has  ever  happened  in  it.  The  great  people  have 
all  been  greater  in  their  own  estimation  than  in  the 
opinion  of  the  world  at  large.  But  Hugh  is  bent  on 
inventing  a  history  of  the  town  if  one  can  not  otherwise 
be  obtained.  He  thinks  he  can  create  a  batch  of  revo 
lutionary  heroes  with  the  pen  as  easily  as  the  queen 
makes  knights  with  the  flat  of  the  sword. 

Hugh  is  not  at  present  on  favorable  terms  with  Milly. 
She  has  accused  him  most  unfairly,  as  he  declares,  of 
taking  a  hand  in  the  Rastus  adventure.  That  painful 
affair  has,  however,  brought  its  compensation.  The 
mother  of  Rastus,  now,  when  she  halts  her  old  horse 
before  the  little  stone  house,  and  Milly  comes  out  bare 
headed  to  do  her  "  trading,"  smiles  on  Milly  benignly, 
and  gives  a  peculiar  cluck  far  down  in  her  throat.  She 
deals  her  out  now  invariably  thirteen  eggs  to  the  dozen, 
which,  considering  her  penurious  disposition,  is  a  very 
high  mark  of  approval.  The  old  lady  is  still  spry  and 
vigorous,  and  does  not  care  to  be  "  sat  upon "  by  a 
daughter-in-law. 

A  more  unfortunate  alienation  exists  between  Hugh 
and  Judge  Magnus.  When  the  judge  is  over  attending 
court  at  the  county  town  Mrs.  Magnus  sometimes  lets 


66  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

him  slip  in  to  dinner  or  tea,  as  she  can  not  wholly  deprive 
herself  of  his  society.  But  the  judge  has  taken  a  severe 
cold  in  his  shoulder  and  now  turns  it  invariably  on 
Hugh.  The  trouble  all  arose  last  fall  when  a  very  excit 
ing  political  campaign  was  opened  in  the  state,  in  which 
Judge  Magnus  took  a  leading  part.  Most  of  the  villa 
gers  are  opposed  to  the  judge  in  politics.  Jake  Small 
came  out  very  strong  against  the  Judge's  candidate  for 
governor,  the  Hon.  Mr.  Highflyer.  As  one  of  the  landed 
proprietors  of  the  town,  he  thought  he  had  a  right  to  be 
heard.  Perhaps  the  judge  did  not  exactly  try  to  corrupt 
his  neighbors  and  to  win  votes  by  favors,  and  what  Jake 
called  "  inflooence,"  but  he  was  determined  Highflyer 
should  be  heard  in  the  village  where  he  lived,  and  should 
receive  such  a  rousing  "  ovation  "  as  was  never  given  to 
any  other  man  in  that  vicinity.  Consequently  a  flaming 
poster  appeared  on  all  the  fences,  trees,  and  dead  walls 
announcing  the  near  advent  of  the  candidate.  There  was 
to  be  a  dinner  at  the  judge's,  to  which  all  the  principal  men 
of  the  village  were  invited,  including  the  parson,  Hugh, 
and  Stephen.  A  meeting  was  arranged  at  Library  Hall, 
where  the  Hon.  Highflyer  would  speak,  and  the  judge 
had  engaged  a  brass  band  to  come  from  the  nearest  large 
place,  that  there  might  be  a  parade  with  music,  and  later 
in  the  evening  a  serenade  to  his  candidate.  The  judge 
also  procured  some  torches  and  waterproof  capes  to  array 
the  loyal  rabble  of  boys  for  a  fitting  turnout,  and  it  was 
rumored  in  the  village  that  he  had  laid  in  a  considerable 
store  of  pinwheels,  rockets,  and  Roman  candles  to  illu 
mine  the  line  of  march. 

Every  thing  was  in  order  for  Highflyer  ;  Aunt  Dinah 
had  been  commissioned  to  prepare  the  fatted  calf.  The 
judge  was  in  his  glory.  He  went  swelling  up  and  down 
Main  Street,  and  stopped  every  body  he  met  to  talk  of 
Highflyer  : 

"  A  big  man,   sir  ;  the  biggest  man  in   the  country. 


THE  HOX.   HIGHFLYER'S    VISIT.  67 

And  you  will  see,  sir,  we  shall  roll  up  an  overwhelming 
majority — yes,  sir,  an  overwhelming  majority,  on  election 
day.  Take  a  cigar,  sir,  and  when  you  can,  call  and  see 
Mrs.  Magnus.  You  know  you  are  to  be  on  hand  for  the 
reception  and  dinner." 

And  thus  with  immense  expansiveness  he  paraded  the 
little  place,  filling  its  smallness  oppressively  full  of  his 
self-importance  and  the  reflected  glory  of  Highflyer. 
The  morning  of  the  great  day  had  arrived,  and  all  was 
in  perfect  order  for  the  ceremonies  to  follow.  Highflyer 
was  to  be  welcomed  at  the  station  as  he  never  had  been 
welcomed  in  all  the  days  of  his  life.  But  at  three  o'clock 
in  the  afternoon  the  judge  received  news  from  Highflyer 
which  gave  him  a  stunning  blow.  The  great  man  was  at 
home  ill  of  a  sore  throat,  and  the  reception  must  perforce 
be  postponed  indefinitely.  It  was  pitiable  to  see  the 
collapse  of  the  judge,  and  Mrs.  Magnus,  with  that 
great  dinner  on  her  hands,  was  not  less  to  be  commis 
erated. 

There  was  no  time  to  lose,  as  the  band  would  soon  get 

on  board  the  train  at  R ,  on   its  way  to  the  village. 

Hugh,  who  happened  to  be  lounging  about  in  the  judge's 
library,  was  commissioned  to  go  and  dispatch  a  telegram 
which  would  keep  it  at  home.  He  was  also  asked  to 
affix  a  hasty  notice  to  the  door  of  Library  Hall  convey 
ing  the  heavy  news  of  Highflyer's  sore  throat.  The 
small  boys  of  the  village  were  about  to  receive  a  crushing 
blow,  and  Hugh  naturally  felt  for  them.  However,  he 
says  he  did  notify  the  band  not  to  come,  by  means  of 
Mr.  Diggs'  "  ticker  "  and  private  wire.  By  this  means 
Mr.  Diggs  transacts  business  in  stocks  in  a  secret  man 
ner  with  a  distant  city,  and  the  general  opinion  in  the 
village  is  that  his  business  is  not  respectable.  Mr.  Diggs' 
ticker,  it  seems,  did  not  work  well  on  this  particular 
occasion,  and  within  an  hour  some  one  who  in  size  and 
figure  much  resembled  Hugh,  well  wrapped  in  an  ulster, 


68  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

and  with  bag  in  hand, .boarded  the  four  o'clock  western 
train. 

The  judge  shut  himself  in  doors,  and  Mrs.  Magnus 
pulled  down  the  front  parlor  shades,  which  always  indi 
cated  that  she  was  not  at  home  to  visitors.  The  notice 
on  the  door  of  Library  Hall,  if  such  existed,  was  not 
visible  to  the  naked  eye.  Apparently,  the  fact  of  the 
Hon.  Mr.  Highflyer's  sore  throat  had  not  leaked  out  in 
the  village.  At  six  o'clock  a  little  sputter  of  yellow  and 
red  fireworks  was  observed  about  the  station.  The  east 
and  west  trains  came  in  almost  at  the  same  moment. 
Suddenly  there  was  a  clash  of  brass  instruments,  and  the 
boys  began  to  hurrah  and  throw  up  their  caps  for  High 
flyer.  Oddly  enough,  the  judge  was  not  on  hand  at  the 
moment  to  welcome  the  great  man  in  person.  But  the 
sheriff  of  the  county,  a  very  active,  even  offensive  parti 
san,  scheming  for  re-election,  was  present  on  the  platform 
with  several  of  his  henchmen.  He  had  seen  Highflyer 
at  a  state  convention  some  years  before,  and  thought  he 
knew  him  well.  Therefore,  when  a  tall  stranger  well 
muffled  about  the  ears  and  mouth,  with  his  hat  some 
what  drawn  down  over  his  brows,  stepped  from  the 
western  train,  the  sheriff  pressed  forward,  seized  him  by 
the  hand,  and  welcomed  him  in  as  neat  a  little  impromptu 
speech  as  had  ever  been  heard  in  the  village. 

The  Hon.  Highflyer,  who  was  suffering  from  a  hoarse 
cold  and  a  sore  throat,  answered  briefly,  but  much  to  the 
point,  and  was  at  once  escorted  to  the  best  livery  hack  in 
the  village.  The  sheriff  immediately  formed  the  proces 
sion  in  line  ;  the  band  struck  up  "  Hail  to  the  Chief." 
The  lads  with  torches  and  capes  ranged  themselves 
behind  the  band.  The  rabble  fell  in  at  the  tag  end,  and 
all  moved  onward  to  Main  Street  amid  a  fizzing  and 
sputtering  of  fireworks,  shouts  for  Highflyer,  hisses  and 
groans  for  Lowlander,  the  opposition  candidate,  cat-calls, 
cheers,  and  other  outbursts  of  enthusiasm.  The  villagers 


THE  HO W.   HIGHFLYER'S    VISIT.  69 

all  rushed  into  the  street.  A  few  had  prepared  to  illumi 
nate  in  a  modest  way,  and  some  of  the  house-fronts 
began  to  blaze  with  tallow  clips.  The  judge  in  the 
retirement  of  his  library  heard  that  fatal  blare  of  brass 
and  the  cheers  of  the  crowd.  He  rushed  bewildered  out 
of  doors  regardless  of  his  hat.  On  came  the  procession, 
the  band  now  tooting  forth,  "  See,  the  Conquering  Hero 
Comes."  The  judge  waved  his  arms  wildly  and  ran  to 
the  front  gate  crying,  "  Stop  !  stop  !  "  But  that  triumphal 
procession  had  neither  eye  nor  ear  for  any  thing  but  the 
matter  in  hand.  It  marched  on  past  the  house  with  the 
dreadful  effigy  of  Highflyer  streaming  to  the  breeze  on  a 
broad  banner  carried  by  the  vanguard — the  din  of  brass 
and  shouts  of  the  multitude.  It  marched  to  the  extreme 
end  of  the  village,  as  far  as  the  old  bridge,  and  back 
again  to  the  judge's  door.  And  on  its  arrival  the  hack 
was  thoroughly  examined.  But  the  Hon.  Mr.  Highflyer 
had  evaporated,  and  refused  to  materialize  again. 

The  judge  was  in  danger  of  apoplexy  from  the  terrible 
state  of  wrath  and  mortification  into  which  he  was  thrown, 
and  Hugh,  when  discovered,  was  found  in  his  dressing- 
gown  and  slippers  quietly  sitting  at  home  in  Aunt  Dido's 
chamber,  inditing  a  page  of  his  history.  Aunt  Dido, 
though  torture  screws  have  been  applied  to  make  her  con 
fess,  will  say  nothing  except  that  Hugh  was  home  at 
supper-time  on  that  fatal  night  ;  but  as  to  the  exact  hour 
of  the  supper  her  memory  fails  her.  The  judge  was 
obliged  to  pay  the  band  full  price  for  time  and  trouble, 
which  was  but  the  smallest  part  of  his  humiliation.  Mrs. 
Magnus,  who  is  always  practical,  gave  the  dinner  which 
had  been  prepared  for  the  next  governor  of  the  state  to 
the  men  of  brass,  who  were  very  hungry.  But  the  worst 
feature  of  the  case  is  the  fact  that  Highflyer  was  most 
shamefully  defeated  by  Lowlander  in  the  near  election 
— so  cut  up,  horse,  foot,  and  artillery,  in  fact,  that  he 
now  says  he  shall  never  again  run  for  any  office,  but 


7°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

intends  to  devote  the  remainder  of  his  life  to  the  compo 
sition  of  his  great  work,  "  What  I  Know  About  Politics." 
A  coldness  quite  down  to  zero  still  continues  between 
Hugh  and  the  judge  ;  and  that  nicest,  most  hospitable 
house  in  the  village  is  unfortunately  closed  to  the  young 
historian  on  all  public  occasions.  The  sheriff  lost  his 
re-election,  and  this  sad  fact  is  attributed  to  the  handsome 
little  speech  he  made  on  the  station  platform  the  even 
ing  of  the  Highflyer  ovation,  scraps  of  which  have  been 
used  to  his  disadvantage  in  the  miserable  little  opposi 
tion  sheet  published  at  the  county  town. 

Accounts  of  this  election  incident  flew  far  and  wide, 
and  for  weeks  the  village  was  quite  famous.  Hugh 
looked  upon  it  as  valuable  material  for  history.  It  is 
not  to  be  supposed  that  he  has  ever  "  given  himself 
away  "  and  confessed  he  personated  Highflyer  on  that 
memorable  evening.  The  sheriff  declares  that  the  per 
son  he  addressed  was  a  taller  and  stouter  man  than 
Hugh,  and  wore  a  dark  mustache,  and  there  are  other 
credible  witnesses  ready  to  swear  to  the  same  facts. 

The  boys,  however,  have  pitched  upon  Hugh  as  their 
benefactor.  They  feel  grateful  to  him  for  the  good  time 
they  enjoyed  swinging  about  the  judge's  torches  and 
shouting  themselves  hoarse  for  Highflyer.  They  have 
named  their  snow  redoubt  on  Sampson's  Hill,  near  the 
school-house,  Fort  Hugh,  and  the  opposing  parties  are 
known  as  Highflyers  and  Lowlanders.  The  battles 
fought  there  during  the  noon  recess  are  of  a  terrible 
ferocity.  They  have  even  placed  Quaker  guns  on  the 
top  of  the  fortification,  and  bodies  of  infantry  can  be 
seen  rolling  downhill  pursued  by  a  shower  of  balls. 

Sampson's  Hill  is  on  the  road  to  Mill  Farm,  a  charm 
ing  wallc  in  summer.  The  path  runs  over  a  stile  and 
trickles  along  through  meadow-grasses,  and  under  tall 
trees,  and  finally  strikes  the  road  to  the  ravine.  The 
fields  thereabout  are  speckled  with  ripe  strawberries  in 


OLD   BETTY   SPEER.  71 

June,  and  the  village  children  resort  to  them  in  their  by- 
hours.  Here,  too,  young  lovers  come  to  walk  under  the 
trees  at  sundown  and  listen  to  the  song  of  the  evening 
thrush. 

Old  Betty  Speer  lives  on  this  road,  in  a  picturesque 
hovel  half  covered  with  vines  and  creepers.  She  receives 
out-door  relief  from  the  poor  guardians  of  the  town,  and 
there  is  a  tradition  that  she  has  money  hidden  away  in 
old  tea-pots  and  tomato-cans  all  over  the  premises.  But 
these  tales  are  entirely  unfounded.  Betty  has  tried 
hard  to  cultivate  a  good  paying  reputation  as  a  witch 
and  fortune-teller,  but  has  made  a  dismal  failure.  'As 
every  well-regulated  village  should  have  an  old  woman 
seeress  to  act  in  this  capacity,  it  is  disappointing  that 
Betty  Speer  should  be  quite  unable  to  inspire  awe  in  the 
smallest  child.  She  occasionally  wheedles  a  dime  out  of 
the  pocket  of  some  country  bumpkin  who  resorts  to  her 
to  find  out  where  lost  or  stolen  articles  are  concealed. 
For  this  purpose  she  pretends  to  look  in  a  rather  curious 
pebble  picked  up  somewhere  about  the  fields.  She  also 
keeps  a  pack  of  greasy  cards  to  reveal  to  young  girls 
the  very  important  fact  as  to  whether  they  are  to  marry 
a  light  or  dark  "  complected  "  man.  Beyond  this  her 
simple  magic  can  not  go.  She  has  picked  up  the  art  of 
distilling  simples,  and  now  makes  a  slight  addition  to 
her  income  by  the  sale  of  a  quack  decoction  put  up  in 
small  black  bottles,  which  she  affirms  "  is  good  for 
rheumatiz  if  rubbed  on  at  the  change  of  the  moon." 

Her  two  cats,  Arnica  and  Malaria,  are  not  even  black. 
Arnica  is  a  pretty  Maltese  and  Malaria  is  white,  with 
black  nose  and  boots.  Sometimes  the  boys  in  the  fort 
on  Sampson's  Hill  turn  their  missiles  against  Betty's  queer 
little  habitation,  from  which  the  smoke  of  the  chimney 
always  streams  forth  in  a  long  vaporous  feather.  But 
nothing  ever  disturbs  the  old  woman's  equanimity  save 
the  need  of  eating  a  poor  dinner.  She  is  short  and  sturdy, 


7 2  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

with  a  black  wary  eye  set  deep  in  her  head.  She  is 
generally  done  up  in  an  old  serge  cloak,  and  over  her 
shoes  when  the  weather  is  snowy  she  draws  on  a  pair  of 
heavy  woolen  stockings.  In  this  guise  she  trudges  all 
over  the  town.  Betty  has  an  unerring  nose  as  to  what 
may  be  cooking  in  the  neighbors'  houses.  Each  fair  day 
she  elects  to  dine  at  some  favorite  place,  and  regardless 
of  an  invitation,  ensconces  herself  in  the  easiest  chair  in 
the  kitchen.  Her  eyes  follow  all  the  operations  of  the 
housewife  with  anxious  scrutiny.  She  has  a  weakness 
for  dumplings,  and  can  scent  them  quite  a  distance  off. 
For  what  is  known  as  "  boiled  dish  "  she  has  as  great  an 
aversion.  When  her  favorite  viands  are  preparing  she 
is  always  glued  to  her  seat  like  a  dumb  thing,  watching 
with  wistful  eyes  for  her  portion  of  the  feast  to  be  placed 
on  the  corner  of  the  kitchen  table.  But  if  "  b'iled  vic 
tuals  "  is  the  order  of  the  day  old  Betty  steals  out  sor 
rowfully,  shaking  the  dust  of  that  kitchen  from  her  shoes. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

THE  VILLAGE    CLUBS. — ST.   PATTY  AND   HER  JUBILEE. 

THE  days  of  quilting-bees,  apple-parings,  and  spelling- 
schools  appear  to  have  vanished.  A  new  order  of 
entertainment  has  sprung  up  in  the  village,  which,  if  not 
more  enjoyable,  is  more  select.  The  mania  for  clubs  has 
reached  our  quiet  precinct,  and  a  number  have  been 
organized  both  for  profit  and  pleasure.  Of  course,  we 
have  lectures  and  concerts  during  the  winter  in  Library 
Hall.  We  have  also  symposia,  a  kind  of  parlor  discourse, 
established  by  a  philosopher  who  was  raised  in  this 
town,  and  who  returns  to  his  native  haunts  for  a  few 
days  or  weeks  during  the  year.  The  symposia  are  only 
held  among  the  cultivated  few.  By  the  uninitiated 
crowd  they  are  sneered  at  and  unmercifully  ridiculed. 
Still  the  advent  of  the  philosopher  makes  a  decided 
ripple  in  the  rather  sluggish  currents  of  village  society, 
and  creates  an  appetite  for  reading  and  speculative 
thought  which,  on  the  whole,  is  profitable.  When  he  is 
with  us  we  all  try  to  appear  as  learned  and  profound  as 
we  can.  The  men,  as  a  rule,  keep  clear  of  him  with  the 
exception  of  one  or  two,  but  there  are  a  number  of 
women  who  sit  devoutly  at  his  feet.  Some  of  these  very 
women,  who  have  heretofore  enjoyed  a  dish  of  gossip 
over  their  tea,  and  have  been  so  little  regardful  of  the 
improvement  of  their  minds  as  to  compare  notes  on 
bonnets  and  gowns,  as  soon  as  the  philosopher  appears, 
put  away  the  vanities  of  life  and  take  to  serious  studies. 
The  library  is  ransacked  for  the  works  of  German  phi 
losophers,  of  Locke,  Mill,  Descartes,  and  a  variety  of 


74  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

other  profound  authors.  It  is  always  impressive  to  have 
these  books  lying  around  on  the  parlor  table  even  if  one 
does  not  read  them  ;  and  the  philosopher  feels  the  com 
pliment  to  himself,  as  he  should.  He  is  perfectly  happy 
when,  as  Deacon  Hildreth's  wife  says,  he  can  get  in  the 
midst  of  a  "  passle  "  of  women  and  have  them  all  listen 
to  him  in  open-eyed  wonder  as  they  try  in  their  inmost 
souls  to  understand  the  philosophical  terms,  such  as 
"cognize,"  "  concept,"  "percept,"  "  self-conscious  per 
sonality,"  and  a  great  variety  of  other  well-sounding 
words  and  phrases. 

As  I  have  hinted,  the  men  of  the  village  generally 
turn  up  their  noses  at  the  philosopher,  because  they  are 
incapable  of  understanding  him,  and  are  jealous  of  his 
influence  over  a  certain  clique  of  women.  The  young 
parson  meets  him  on  that  happy  neutral  ground  which  he 
has  chosen  for  friendly  controversy,  where  he  gleans 
new  ideas  and  gathers  fresh  inspiration.  He  is  cordial 
to  all  who  bring  grist  to  his  mill,  let  them  call  themselves 
what  they  may.  Hugh,  on  the  contrary,  looks  askance 
at  the  invader  for  poaching  on  ground  which  he  feels 
belongs  of  right  to  himself — the  domain  of  female  influ 
ence — and  consequently,  as  he  has  no  special  bent  toward 
speculative  thought,  he  generally  goes  on  a  long  tramp 
when  the  philosopher  is  around.  The  old  shoemaker, 
with  his  long  white  hair  and  complexion  like  old  ivory, 
is  the  only  man  in  the  village  who  thoroughly  under 
stands  the  history  of  philosophy,  but  he,  faithful  to  his 
lapstone,  is  never  lured  away  to  any  of  the  parlor  sym 
posia.  When  the  philosopher  lectures  in  Library  Hall, 
as  he  sometimes  does,  to  a  select  few  of  his  admirers,  the 
shoemaker,  much  to  the  speaker's  annoyance,  stations 
himself  on  the  front  bench  with  a  smile  childlike  and 
bland  wreathing  his  countenance.  Milly,  who  has  always 
been  a  devotee  of  Plato  and  Spinoza,  because  of  their 
affirmative  spiritual  side,  is  no  general  student,  still  she 


THE   PHILOSOPHER.  75 

has  a  strong  leaning  toward  speculative  studies,  and  has 
been  known  to  lock  her  shop  when  it  was  full  of  spring 
work  to  go  and  sit  at  the  philosopher's  feet  in  Miss 
Drusilla's  parlor. 

The  philosopher  is  a  short  man  with  a  very  large  head, 
covered  with  bushy  hair.  He  wears  spectacles  of  course, 
and  a  great  beard  and  mustache  give  him  a  leonine 
aspect.  But  he  is  the  most  approachable,  gentle,  kindly- 
mannered  little  man  in  the  world  when  he  is  not  lost  in 
abstractions.  Then  the  light  seems  to  go  out  behind  his 
spectacles,  and  he  will  sit  in  one  position  for  hours 
together.  But  he  is  a  human  creature  with  a  heart  which 
vibrates  to  the  awed  attention  and  the  homage  of  his 
coterie.  It  has  been  queried  whether  he  ever  looks  at  a 
woman's  face,  or  knows  whether  she  is  young  or  old, 
well-favored  or  ugly.  But  I  suspect  that  the  beautiful 
face  draws  even  him,  and  that  barred  up  somewhere  in 
the  "  Ego  "  is  a  living  man. 

Of  course,  it  is  quite  a  strain  on  our  intellectual  \vomen 
to  have  the  philosopher  with  us  for  a  fortnight  or  three 
weeks,  the  usual  length  of  his  stay.  It  is  very  taxing  to 
the  brain  to  try  to  appear  profound  all  that  length  of 
time,  to  abandon  one's  usual  low  altitude  of  thought  and 
feeling  and  mount  of  a  sudden  into  the  clear,  bracing 
but  rather  chilly  realm  of  abstract  ideas.  For  a  week 
after  the  philosopher  has  taken  his  departure  little  is 
heard  in  some  of  our  parlors,  but  the  reverberations  and 
echoes  of  his  lectures  on  the  philosophy  of  religion. 
Such  words  and  phases  as  "  Socinian,"  "  Arminian,"  the 
"  sensational  school,"  "the  spiritual  school,"  "  the  soul 
entity,"  seem  to  roll  and  mutter  in  all  the  corners  like 
half-spent  thunder.  But  presently  we  give  a  long  sigh 
of  relief  ;  we  recognize  the  fact  that  we  have  been  under 
great  cerebral  pressure  and  need  a  little  wholesome 
recreation  to  let  us  down  with  safety  to  the  ordinary  flats 
and  shallows  of  real  life. 


76  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

A  fortnight  after  the  philosopher's  departure  the 
village  is  a  scene  of  wild  dissipation.  "  Tea  fights,"  whist 
parties,  club  meetings,  crowd  upon  each  other's  heels. 
The  heavy  tomes  which  have  weighed  down  our  tables 
are  sent  back  to  the  library  shelves  where  they  belong, 
and  out  of  corners  come  creeping  the  despised  fancy 
work  which  was  shoved  aside  to  make  room  for  them. 
The  crochet  bag,  the  knitting  basket,  the  Kensington 
art  work,  of  which  we  should  have  been  ashamed  in  the 
philosopher's  presence,  again  resume  their  sway.  Women 
enjoy  themselves  immensely  talking  over  family  diseases 
and  the  gossip  of  the  neighborhood.  It  is  as  if  they  had 
been  away  on  a  long  journey  and  had  come  together  for 
the  first  time  to  hear  the  home  news.  Even  Drusilla  is 
more  active  and  energetic  in  town  affairs  than  ever. 
Being  intensely  practical,  Drusilla  is  not  of  the  philo 
sophic  cast  of  mind,  but  she  has  taken  to  patronizing 
philosophy  because  it  is  neither  frivolous  nor  petty. 
Drusilla  wishes  to  emancipate  herself  from  feminine 
limitations.  She  rejoices  in  not  being  troubled  with  any 
of  the  weaknesses  of  her  sex.  As  I  said,  there  are 
several  clubs  in  the  village  embracing  all  ages  and  con 
ditions.  The  high-school  girls  have  one  in  which  they 
talk  of  archaic  Greek  art  and  early  Assyrian  pottery  ; 
but  exactly,  in  proportion  as  you  recede  from  the  high- 
school  age  you  will  find  the  clubs  growing  lighter  in 
character,  until  with  the  old  ladies  nothing  but  pure 
amusement  and  recreation  is  intended.  They  call  them 
selves  the  Wintergreens,  and  their  insignia  is  a  little 
sprig  of  that  plant  pinned  into  a  kerchief  or  adorning  a 
dress-cap.  The  Wintergreens  meet  semi-occasionally, 
when  the  old  men  are  engaged  at  town-meeting  or  have 
a  monthly  session  of  their  Saturday-Night  Club.  Part 
of  the  regular  programme  is  an  old-fashioned  supper 
where  tea-cup  fortunes  are  told.  The  frisky  perform 
ances  of  the  Wintergreens  and  their  inextinguishable  fun 


THE    WINTERGREENS.  77 

and  laughter  are  the  delight  of  the  town.  Very  comical 
stories  leak  out  in  regard  to  their  secret  sessions,  for  the 
greater  part  of  their  meetings  are  held  with  closed  doors. 
Occasionally  the  old  men  are  invited  to  be  present,  and 
once  or  twice  a  general  town  invitation  has  been  given 
out.  But  the  private  meetings  are  the  most  enjoyable. 
As  the  Wintergreens  are  particularly  secret  and  silent 
about  their  doings,  public  curiosity  is  whetted  to  a  keen 
edge.  It  is  known  that  they  sometimes  play  old-fashioned 
games,  and  tell  ancient  love  stories,  and  rehearse  the 
triumphs  of  their  girlhood.  A  prize  has  even  been  offered 
for  the  best  love  tale,  and  to  judge  from  the  peals  of 
laughter  which  ring  out  when  this  pastime  is  going  for 
ward,  it  is  one  of  the  most  enjoyable. 

No  old  woman  can  become  a  Wintergreen  until  she  is 
willing  to  tell  her  age  and  take  her  Bible  oath  thereon. 
Sixty  is  about  the  limit  for  admissions,  and  several  have 
not  gone  in  until  past  their  seventieth  year.  Drusilla, 
who  is  only  a  few  years  past  fifty,  proposed  herself  for 
membership,  but  she  was  blackballed  on  other  grounds. 
The  old  ladies  were  afraid  of  her  genius  for  manage 
ment  ;  and,  as  Mrs.  Deacon  Hildreth  said,  they  wished 
to  "  boss  "  their  own  affairs.  Drusilla  would  speedily 
have  transformed  them  into  something  else.  When  the 
weather  is  unfavorable,  a  carriage  or  sleigh  goes  out  as 
far  as  Mill  Farm  and  picks  up  the  Wintergreens  ;  and 
the  secret  conclave  invariably  breaks  up  at  ten.  It  is 
thought  this  club  has  had  something  to  do  in  preserving 
in  the  beauty  of  age  a  number  of  our  bright-eyed,  fresh- 
complextoned,  cheerful  old  women,  who  continue  useful 
in  their  own  sphere,  and  give  a  certain  dignity  and  grace 
to  village  life.  Aunt  Dido  is  a  leading  spirit  among  the 
Wintergreens. 

The  young  parson  encourages  wholesome,  innocent 
amusement  among  all  classes  of  people.  He  has  joined 
an  athletic  club,  and  is  one  of  the  best  wheelmen  and 


78  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

oarsmen  of  the  town.  He  has  of  late  given  a  sermon  on 
dancing  which  has  offended  a  few  of  the  tender  con 
sciences.  It  was  thought  at  one  critical  moment  there 
might  be  a  division  in  the  church  on  this  burning  ques 
tion,  and  the  young  parson  stood  to  his  guns  and  con 
fessed  himself  ready  to  resign.  His  pretty  wife  was  in 
tears,  and  the  women  of  the  neighborhood  came  in  and 
put  their  arms  about  her  and  declared  they  could  never 
love  another  clergyman's  wife  so  well.  Then  they  went 
home,  and  decided  if  the  breach  was  not  healed  and  the 
poor  thing  was  obliged  to  go  from  them,  they  would  pre 
sent  her,  as  a  parting  gift,  with  a  handsome  black  silk 
gown,  which,  I  am  fain  to  confess,  the  poor  thing  needs. 
But  the  breach  was  healed  through  the  diplomacy  of 
Deacon  Hildreth,  who  is  known  in  the  village  as  the 
Town  Clock.  He  always  walks  on  the  same  side  of  the 
street,  rises  and  goes  to  bed  at  the  same  hours,  and  offers 
the  same  stereotyped  blessing  at  table,  and  the  same 
prayer  in  the  weekly  prayer-meeting.  Some  of  the 
children,  hearing  him  called  the  Town  Clock,  have 
actually  believed  that  he  possesses  wheel-work  inside 
his  plethoric  body  which  can  be  wound  up  and  made 
to  tick.  Happily  the  deacon  knew  nothing  of  the  mod 
ern  theory  that  our  games  and  pastimes  are  the  survivals 
of  old  heathenish  religious  festivals.  But  he  knew  his 
Bible  ;  and,  like  the  famous  man  who  said  it  was  a  pity 
the  devil  should  have  all  the  good  tunes,  the  deacon  was 
ready  to  do  battle  with  the  same  potentate  for  some  of 
the  good  amusements.  It  was  a  great  surprise,  there 
fore,  when  at  the  next  stated  meeting  he  rose  slowly 
from  his  seat  and  gave  his  testimony  in  favor  of  the  par 
son.  It  was  an  incontrovertible  fact,  he  said,  that  David 
danced  before  the  ark  ;  dancing  was  not  therefore  per  se 
a  wicked  act.  The  fate  of  the  young  woman  who 
mocked  David  out  of  the  window  was  also  judiciously 
touched  upon,  and  the  fine  lesson  educed  that  even  our 


£>R  U  SILL  A .  1  "  W I  V^rT  7  9 

amusements  may  be  holy  and  worshipful  if  indulged  in 
the  right  spirit.  As  the  deacon,  the  central*  piHar  of  the 
church,  had  gone  over  to  the  enemy,  the  case  against  the 
clergyman  broke  down,  but  the  ladies,  I  am  sorry  to  say, 
forgot  to  present  that  black  silk  gown  to  his  pretty  wife. 
Drusilla  also  supported  the  parson,  and  she  is  a  power 
in  the  parish.  There  are  women  doomed  to  rule  a  petty 
hamlet  who  only  need  a  wider  sphere  to  make  them 
selves  famous.  Drusilla  is  one  of  this  variety.  Form 
ally  she  was  known  all  over  the  village  and  surrounding 
parts  as  Miss  Drusey,  but  she  abhors  the  name  and  re 
fuses  to  turn  the  light  of  her  favor  on  any  one  who  in 
dulges  in  its  easy  colloquialism.  Drusilla  has  the  Ro 
man  matron  in  its  sound,  and  she  has  the  Roman  in  her 
blood.  Ordinary  women  she  looks  upon  with  contempt 
uous  pity,  and  is  half  ashamed  that  the  fates  have  denied 
her  that  manhood  she  might  so  nobly  have  honored. 
But  Drusilla  is  politic,  and  knows  how  to  conciliate. 
She  has  gradually  drawn  into  her  hands  all  the  work  of 
the  parish  a  woman  can  do,  and  some  that  no  woman 
has  ever  aspired  to  do  before  her  time.  She  has  re-or 
ganized  the  Sunday-school  and  straightened  out  the 
choir.  She  attends  to  all  the  festivals,  fairs,  Lady 
Washington  teas,  Christmas  trees,  and  ministers'  conven 
tions.  She  could  do  it  single-handed,  but  that  is  not  al 
lowable,  and  her  coadjutors  have  become  mere  clay  and 
putty  in  her  strong  grasp.  It  is  said  that  the  young 
parson  is  afraid  to  fall  ill  of  a  Sunday,  for  fear  that 
Drusilla  would  mount  into  the  pulpit  and  preach  in  his 
stead.  He  knows  her  worth,  and  values  it  justly,  even 
while  he  is  struggling  to  keep  her  out  of  his  place.  The 
only  rival  she  has  to  dread  is  Mrs.  Judge  Magnus,  who 
is  of  an  energetic  and  unquenchable  spirit.  But  the 
judge's  wife  is  absent  in  Washington  during  part  of 
the  year,  and  she  never  regains  during  the  summer  and 
autumn  what  she  loses  in  the  winter. 


8o  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

I  have  always  suspected  that  Drusilla  was  born  with 
her  bonnet  on,  the  strings  untied  and  thrown  over  her 
shoulders.  She  is  large  and  fair,  and  could  easily  be 
handsome  if  she  paid  attention  to  dress.  But  her 
clothes  are  always  of  the  same  plain  cut  and  pattern,  and 
are  known  as  Drusilla's  business  suit.  Though  neat,  she 
would  scorn  to  condescend  to  any  of  the  fripperies  of 
fashion.  Her  hair  has  a  pretty  ripple  and  gleam  upon 
it,  like  sunlight  on  running  water,  but  it  is  always 
brushed  behind  her  ears  with  severe  simplicity.  She 
wears  no  ring  nor  jewel  of  any  kind,  and  when  she  is  in 
vited  out  to  dinner  or  to  an  evening  party  she  invariably 
appears  in  a  stuff  gown.  Of  course  she  has  no  wish  to 
conceal  her  age,  since  she  tried  to  get  into  the  Winter- 
green  Club,  that  she  might  reform  it  from  the  inside. 

We  have,  as  I  have  said,  a  number  of  nice  old  people 
among  us,  but  Drusilla's  mother  is  the  gem  of  the  collec 
tion.  She  lives  in  a  real  old  colonial  house  which  has 
come  down  to  her  through  several  generations.  The 
sword  of  a  brave  ancestor  is  suspended  in  the  wide, 
spacious  hall  against  a  tattered  set  of  colors  carried,  it  is 
said,  at  the  battle  of  Saratoga.  Her  presses,  and 
drawers,  and  cupboards  are  full  of  relics  and  mementoes 
of  other  days,  and  her  memory  of  things  that  occurred 
half  a  century  or  more  ago  is  vividly  bright.  Hugh  in 
tends  to  work  up  several  chapters  of  his  history  from  the 
old  lady's  reminiscences.  All  her  own  boys,  now  stal 
wart  men,  are  away  in  the  far  West,  where  they  have 
made  their  fortunes.  One  of  them,  a  great  ranchman, 
has  been  governor  of  his  territory.  When  he  comes 
home  to  see  "mother"  he  always  brings  a  bandbox 
containing  a  new  dress-cap  which  he  ties  about  the  dear 
old  face  with  his  own  hands,  and  tells  her  she  is  the  belle 
of  the  village. 

Drusilla's  mother  is  unlike  her  capable  daughter.  She 
is  fond  of  dress  and  takes  a  great  deal  of  pride  in  her 


ST.    PATTY'S  JUBILEE.  Si 

appearance.  And  indeed  she  is  beautiful,  with  soft 
chirpy  ways,  like  an  aged  canary.  A  touch  of  gratified 
red  flutters  into  her  cheek  over  a  compliment  ;  her  eye 
brightens,  and  she  straightens  up  and  quavers  a  merry 
laugh  exceedingly  pleasant  to  hear.  The  children  and 
young  people  are  in  the  way  of  bringing  her  small  pres 
ents,  wild-flowers,  the  first  strawberries,  roses  from  the 
early  bush,  small  works  they  have  wrought  and  embroid 
ered — a  kerchief  for  the  neck,  a  bag  to  hold  the  snuff 
box.  I  am  fain  to  confess  she  does  snuff  just  the  least 
bit,  but  she  is  so  neat  the  white  muslin  on  her  neck  never 
bears  the  least  stain,  and  her  delicate  old  hands,  with  the 
wedding  ring,  grown  so  small,  are  like  faded  lilies. 

An  intense  rivalry  has  sprung  up  among  the  small 
towns  in  our  vicinity  as  to  their  very  old  people.  The 
local  papers  are  constantly  inserting  paragraphs  about 
aged  women  over  one  hundred,  who  rise  in  the  small 
hours,  pick  up  a  basket  of  chips,  build  the  fire,  and  milk 
a  few  cows  before  breakfast.  They  can  all  see  to  thread 
a  cambric  needle  without  glasses,  and  several  of  them 
have  cut  new  sets  of  teeth  in  their  second  childhood. 
Of  course  the  laudable  desire  to  possess  the  oldest  and 
smartest  person  of  this  kind  has  developed  in  our  village. 
We  do  not  in  this  respect  wish  to  kootoo  to  River  Junc 
tion,  Slabville,  Smith  Forks,  or  the  Barrens.  Now  a. very 
singular  thing  happened  to  Drusilla's  mother.  Her 
family  archives  were  accidentally  burned  a  long  time  ago, 
and  for  many  years  she  seemed  to  have  forgotten  the 
exact  year  of  her  birth  ;  and  there  was  no  one  in  the 
neighborhood  who  could  remember  so  far  back.  Dru 
silla's  mother  has  always  been  accustomed  to  dress  up 
things  with  those  pretty  touches  which  lend  themselves 
so  readily  to  an  imaginative  mind.  Not  that  she  deliber 
ately  falsifies.  Such  a  suspicion  would  shock  the  sen 
sibilities  of  her  neighbors,  who  have  always  felt  that  they 
must  take  her  narratives  with  a  pinch  of  skeptical  salt. 


82  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS, 

Years  ago  Brasilia,  who  is  entirely  devoid  of  imagination, 
whose  clear  dry-light  intellect  is  marked  off  like  a  checker 
board  into  accurate  squares,  was  constantly  in  the  habit 
of  correcting  her  mother,  but  now  that  she  is  so  very  old, 
much  to  the  relief  of  the  family  friends,  Drusilla  lets  her 
twitter  along  without  interruption.  We  have  known  for 
a  number  of  years  that  Drusilla's  mother  was  past  ninety, 
and  some  few  seasons  since  we  celebrated  what  was  given 
out  in  an  indirect  way  by  the  old  lady  herself,  to  be  her 
ninety-fifth  birthday.  Since  so  much  has  been  said  in 
the  newspapers  about  centenarians,  and  the  luster  they 
shed  on  a  small  town,  Drusilla's  mother  has  been  fired 
with  the  laudable  ambition  to  become  the  oldest  inhabitant 
of  the  whole  country-side.  She  has  received  a  kind  of 
canonization  while  still  alive  because  she  has  been  so 
very  good-natured  as  to  live  to  be  almost  a  hundred. 
She  is  called  St.  Patty,  a  name  which  exactly  suits  her, 
although  the  idea  of  St.  Patty  being  the  mother  of  Dru 
silla  is  supremely  ridiculous.  Well,  we  did  intend  to 
have  St.  Patty's  portrait  painted  by  subscription  at  the 
time  of  her  centenary  and  hung  among  the  pictures  of 
our  local  worthies  in  the  library  bookroom.  We  already 
have  a  bust  and  two  large  photographs  of  the  judge 
which  he  has  presented  to  the  town.  Of  course,  as  St. 
Patty  celebrated  some  years  ago  her  ninety-fifth  birth- 
day,  we  have  of  late  been  planning  what  we  would  do  on 
the  great  anniversary  close  at  hand.  The  old  lady 
entered  into  our  scheme  with  enthusiasm.  The  young 
clergyman  was  to  deliver  an  address  on  the  honor  she 
had  done  the  town.  Hugh  was  to  give  an  historical 
survey  of  St.  Patty's  ancestors  and  their  deeds,  bringing 
the  narrative  of  the  family  down  to  date.  Our  literary 
young  lady,  who  contributes  to  the  magazines,  had 
promised  an  ode,  and  the  local  glee  club  had  been  prac 
ticing  some  time  for  the  great  occasion. 

It  was  noticeable  that  when  the  jubilee  was  talked  of 


ST.    PATTY'S  CONFESSION.  83 

Drusilla  immediately  left  the  room.  We  all  set  it  down 
to  family  modesty,  and  felt  that  Drusilla  had  acquired  a 
notion  of  good  taste  quite  new  and  surprising.  Happily, 
the  anniversary  would  fall  in  May,  at  a  time  when  there 
was  abundance  of  flowers  to  trim  the  house  and  adorn  our 
St.  Patty.  But  as  the  time  approached  we  noticed  the 
old  lady  began  to  languish  and  droop.  She  lost  her 
appetite,  her  eyes  grew  dim,  her  hand  shook,  and  she 
would  sit  and  brood  an  hour  together — so  unlikely  a  thing 
for  St.  Patty  to  do  that  the  whole  village  became  alarmed, 
and  the  doctor  was  called  in.  He  found  the  old  lady 
wiping  away  a  furtive  tear-drop,  but  he  could  discover 
no  marked  symptoms  of  bodily  ailment.  Something  was 
weighing  on  her  mind.  Her  memory  was  a  little  con 
fused,  and  she  mixed  up  people's  names,  and  brought  in 
some  of  neighbors  long  dead.  The  doctor  prescribed  a 
soothing  mixture  and  went  away.  A  week  passed  in  this 
unsatisfactory  manner,  the  whole  village  dreading  to  hear 
that  St.  Patty  had  taken  to  her  bed.  But  at  the  end  of 
that  time  her  spirits  did  not  seem  to  improve,  and  one 
day  she  sent  for  the  young  clergyman,  which  we  all  took 
for  a  bad  sign.  When  the  parson  entered  her  room,  she 
was  holding  a  cambric  handkerchief  to  her  eyes,  and  there 
was  a  half  audible  sob  in  her  throat. 

"  I  wanted  to  see  you  to  make  a  confession,"  she  began 
brokenly.  "  I'm  afraid  I  am  a  foolish,  vain,  wicked  old 
woman.  You  know  the  family  Bible  was  burned  in  the 
Hadley  fire  twenty-five  years  ago.  Well,  Drusilla  was 
my  youngest,  and  she  says  she's  going  on  fifty-three,  and 
of  course  she  knows.  I  must  be  a  few  years  younger 
than  I  thought,  just  a  few  years,  you  know  ;  I  can't  make 
out  how  many,  more  or  less.  I  wanted  to  oblige  the 
folks,  they  were  so  set  on  celebrating,  but  I've  been 
going  over  it  in  my  mind,  and  allow  it  wouldn't  be 
right." 

And  then  St.  Patty  broke  down  and  shed  all  the  tears 


84  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

which  had  been  pent  up  in  her  heart.  We  had  the  cele 
bration  just  the  same,  but  our  village  on  the  score  of  the 
oldest  inhabitant  has  been  obliged  to  bow  its  head  to 
Slabville,  which  is  very  humiliating. 


CHAPTER  X. 

THE  POOR-HOUSE  CHILDREN  AND  OLD  PETER*S  GIRLS. 

ONE  of  the  prettiest  drives  out  from  the  village  leads 
to  the  poor-house.  The  road  runs  through  a  tangle 
of  wildering  lanes  and  old  farm  roads,  skirted  by  stone 
fences  and  abundant  trees.  In  early  spring,  when  the 
grass  is  of  a  uniform  tender  green,  an  Arcadian  sense  of 
quiet  hangs  over  these  lanes.  Once  or  twice  you  come 
to  an  old  cellar-place,  or  broken  chimney,  with  a  circle  of 
straggling  bushes,  indicating  an  extinct  family  life.  Stray 
sheep  nibble  about  in  these  places  and  crop  the  wild 
herbage.  The  lanes  are  bordered  with  cherry  and  plum 
trees.  Early  in  the  season,  before  they  have  put  forth  a 
single  shoot,  the  grass  grows  tufted  around  the  old  roots, 
and  blue-birds  flit  through  the  empty  branches  and  make 
the  scene  softer  with  their  notes. 

The  poor-house  is  a  long,  low,  unpainted  building, 
with  a  faculty  of  looking  ugly  which  institutions  of  the 
kind  always  possess,  even  when  planted  in  the  most  en 
chanting  landscape.  During  the  summer  it  is  rather 
thinly  tenanted.  The  clean  rooms,  with  their  poor-house 
odor,  a  smell  of  some  kind  of  strong  soap,  their  high 
beds  covered  with  old-fashioned  blue  spreads,  their 
meager  little  wash-stands  and  board  presses,  are  often 
empty,  swept  and  garnished.  The  place  fills  up  in  the 
fall  when  the  tramping  season  is  over,  but  there  are  a 
few  decayed  old  people,  regular  boarders,  as  Mrs.  Tripp, 
the  matron,  calls  them,  who  remain  the  year  round. 
They  are  too  old  to  go  tramping  in  summer,  and  their 
greatest  change  is  a  move  from  the  stove-heated  rooms 
of  cold  weather  to  the  summer  porch. 


86  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

They  are  gray,  shadowy,  crooked  old  folk,  who  look 
rather  discontented,  though  they  are  treated  with  great 
kindness.  Mrs.  Tripp  is  a  round,  jolly  woman  with  a 
good  face.  She  knits  perpetually,  even  while  she  is  walking 
about  the  house  overseeing  and  giving  directions.  She 
says  they  have  little  to  complain  of,  but  it  is  a  necessity 
with  them  to  grumble,  if  of  nothing  else,  on  the  size  of 
the  dole  of  tea  and  "  baccy  "  they  receive  every  week. 
We  have  a  society  in  the  village  to  furnish  them  with 
flowers  and  little  delicacies  and  reading  matter.  The 
oldest  of  them  like  children's  story  books,  with  bright 
colored  pictures.  There  are  young  girls  who  come  out 
once  a  week  to  read  to  them,  or  write  letters,  but  very 
few  have  friends  or  kindred  they  remember  as  living. 
They  have  forgotten  most  of  their  joys,  hopes,  and  affec 
tions,  and  retain  only  voracious  appetite  and  other  en 
during  bodily  sensations. 

The  parson  goes  out  occasionally  to  give  them  a  Bible 
reading  and  a  talk,  but  the  ungrateful,  pampered  old 
creatures  are  not  much  edified.  Thaddeus,  the  oldest  of 
the  inmates,  generally  grunts  and  says  he  "hain't  no 
stummick  for  parson  preachifying  ;  what  he  wants  is 
suthin'  to  wet  his  whistle,"  meaning  whisky,  which  now 
he  never  gets.  The  old  creature  has  been  preserved  in 
spirits.  His  toughness  and  tenacity  of  life  sheds  a  kind 
of  luster  on  the  poor-house.  His  much  enduring  wife 
bore  many  a  cruel  beating  from  his  hand.  Thad,  who  is 
a  humorist,  said  it  was  because  she  was  "  so  poor  spirited  ; 
if  she  had  once  showed  fight  he  never  could  have  found 
the  heart  to  strike  her."  Well,  the  poor  sodden  creature 
went  out  like  a  smoky  candle,  and  Thad  in  his  old  age 
came  heavily  upon  the  town.  Now  he  is  forced  to  be 
sober  and  virtuous.  He  hates  the  authorities  who  built 
the  poor-house,  and  have  converted  him  against  his  will 
into  a  harmless  old  person.  His  chronic  growl  "  ag'in 
government  "  and  the  laws  of  the  land  is  a  constant  sup- 


POOR-HOUSE  IXMATES.  87 

port  to  his  declining  years.  Mrs.  Tripp  calls  Thad  her 
pet  lamb.  She  is  rather  proud  of  him  as  a  show-person 
who  may  be  induced  to  get  up  his  growl  for  visitors,  as 
a  dog  is  taught  to  bark  for  a  reward. 

There  are  generally  one  or  two  mildly  insane  people 
confined  in  other  portions  of  the  building.  One  of  them 
imagines  herself  the  Virgin  Mary,  and  sits  veiled  most  of 
the  time.  Another  thinks  he  is  a  quart  bottle  and  gur 
gles  in  his  throat  when  he  speaks  like  a  full  flask.  There 
are  also  a  few  weak-minded  children  who  have  come 
upon  the  town  by  the  death  or  poverty  of  their  parents. 
These  children  are  the  pets  of  the  establishment,  and,  in 
their  way,  form  an  interesting  little  group.  In  pleasant 
weather  they  spend  most  of  their  time  in  an  open  court 
yard  where  there  is  a  grass-plot  and  a  few  trees.  A  shed 
in  one  corner  gives  them  shelter  from  the  sun  and  rain. 
Here  they  keep  such  little  possessions  as  have  been  given 
them  or  they  can  gather  for  themselves.  One  possesses 
a  tame  chicken  that  pecks  about  on  the  gravel  ;  another 
is  the  happy  owner  of  a  rabbit  and  a  little  hutch.  One 
or  two  possess  hideous  rag-babies,  mere  bundles  of  straw 
or  sticks  covered  with  old  cloth,  which  they  tenderly  cher 
ish  and  take  to  bed  with  them  every  night. 

A  kind  lady  has  given  these  children  some  of  the  colored 
figures,  globes,  and  disks  now  used  in  the  instruction  of 
the  weak-minded,  and  they  have  been  taught  a  little,  so 
that  it  is  plain  to  see  that  with  care  their  rudimentary 
intelligence  ought  to  be  considerably  developed.  All  of 
them  are  bodily  infirm.  The  strongest  can  scarcely  walk 
alone.  Some  have  learned  to  walk  several  times,  and 
have  forgotten  how  in  the  end,  or  lost  all  control  of  their 
paralyzed  limbs  for  months  together.  Still  they  manage 
to  move  a  little  either  by  means  of  hands  or  feet,  or  both, 
with  ingenuity  quite  surprising.  Watch  them  when  they 
think  themselves  unobserved,  and  you  will  see  there 
is  a  certain  method  in  their  pathetic  little  attempts  at 


88  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

play — a  shadowing  forth  of  the  instincts  of  healthy  child 
life. 

Mick,  who  is  perhaps  twelve  years  old,  though  stunted 
and  withered  about  the  legs,  is  not  feeble-minded  in  the 
ordinary  sense  of  the  term.  His  defects  came  from  an 
injury  to  his  head  received  in  early  infancy.  Mick  is  a 
feeble-minded  child  of  genius,  if  you  can  imagine  such  a 
being.  His  face  is  that  of  an  old  man,  and  his  eyes  have 
a  shrewd  twinkle,  showing  how  much  he  knows. 
Though  he  can  talk  very  imperfectly,  Mick  readily  under 
stands  every  thing  that  is  said,  and  picks  tip  even  unfa 
miliar  ideas  with  marvelous  quickness.  He  is  invaluable 
to  Mrs.  Tripp,  for  she  gives  him  the  general  charge  of 
the  other  children  during  the  day,  and  he  is  so  excellent 
a  disciplinarian  that  she  seldom  finds  fault  with  his  rule 
unless  to  scold  him  for  over-severity.  Mick  has  a  keen 
sense  of  justice.  When  the  bread  for  the  eleven  o'clock 
luncheon  is  given  out,  not  one  of  the  little  creatures  dares 
take  more  than  his  share,  knowing  that  the  eye  of  the 
tyrant  is  upon  him. 

He  has  an  intense  love  of  color.  He  would  perhaps 
have  been  an  artist  had  he  attained  a  normal  develop 
ment.  He  has  covered  his  clothes  with  patches,  tags 
and  ends  of  bright  cloth  which  he  has  picked  up,  and  he 
worships  his  clothes  as  devoutly  as  an  Indian  his  totem. 
In  summer,  when  the  fields  about  are  full  of  daisies 
and  buttercups,  the  other  feeble  little  creatures  will  man 
age  to  pick  a  few  only  to  drop  them  from  their  nerveless 
fingers,  but  Mick  trims  himself  all  over  with  the  posies, 
and  is  as  proud  as  Punch.  You  should  see  Mick  exer 
cising  authority  over  the  others  when,  as  he  tries  to  say, 
he  keeps  school.  School  is  held  on  a  long  bench  under 
the  shed,  where  Mick  ranges  the  scholars  with  an  accurate 
eye  to  size.  Then  he  mounts  a  little  stool  in  front  of 
the  row,  and  with  a  long  stick  and  a  vigilant  outlook 
keeps  the  most  tyrannous  order.  If  any  child  ventures 


MICK'S  MOURNING  BADGE.  89 

to  wink  or  yawn  while  school  is  in,  down  comes  the 
switch  with  a  sharp  tingle.  Mick  possesses  a  large  glass 
marble,  which  he  sometimes  allows  a  very  good  scholar 
to  hold  in  its  feeble  hand  as  a  reward  of  merit  for  a  few 
minutes.  If  it  has  not  been  given  out  during  the  session, 
it  is  certain  the  class  has  been  unruly,  and  has  suffered 
more  than  usual  from  the  switch. 

When  one  of  the  old  people  dies  it  is  an  event  of  great 
interest  in  the  poor-house.  Those  who  are  left  of  about 
the  same  age  congratulate  themselves  on  their  greatei 
tenacity  of  life.  The  good  rule,  Speak  no  ill  of  the  dead, 
is  not  strictly  observed.  Bill  or  Jimmy,  or  whoever  the 
departed  may  have  been,  is  generally  criticised  as  a 
"  dretful  meechin',  no-account  kind  of  creeter'  thus  to 
give  up  so  long  as  the  poor-house  exists  as  a  home  for 
onfortunits."  Mick  by  some  means  or  other  gathers, 
through  his  imperfect  senses,  the  whole  significance  of 
the  event.  Before  the  funeral  he  keeps  even  a  more 
strict  rule  than  usual  among  the  little  ones,  and  cuffs  any 
child  disposed  to  make  a  noise.  Around  the  wrist  of 
each  he  ties  a  shred  of  black  rag  as  a  proper  token  of 
respect  to  the  departed,  and  wears  the  same  himself. 
No  one  ever  told  Mick  that  black  is  the  symbol  of 
death.  It  is  a  notion  he  has  picked  up  of  himself,  and 
woe  to  the  unfortunate  little  one  who  dares  pull  off  the 
mourning  badge  before  the  funeral.  But  after  that  event 
has  taken  place  Mick  forgets  all  about  it  and  turns  to 
some  new  idea. 

On  the  road  to  the  poor-house  stands  a  picturesque 
but  rather  dilapidated  stone  dwelling  with  an  upper 
gallery  reached  by  an  outside  flight  of  steps.  In  sum 
mer  the  place  attracts  the  eye  because  of  the  ragged 
wildness  of  its  garden,  overgrown  as  it  is  with  bushes 
and  weeds  and  tall  grass.  Old  Peter  lived  for  many 
years  in  this  house  with  his  two  hoydenish  girls,  whose 
pranks  were  the  talk  of  the  town,  He  was  a.  well-to-do 


9°  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

miserly  old  curmudgeon,  who  allowed  his  aged  mother 
to  die  in  the  poor-house.  She  was  a  notorious  scold  and 
backbiter,  but  the  whole  village  reprobated  the  conduct 
of  old  Peter,  and  has  never  found  a  good  word  to  fling 
after  him.  His  wife  died  when  the  girls  had  just  entered 
their  'teens,  and  he  dispensed  with  hired  help  and  strove 
to  make  them  do  the  work  of  the  house.  But  the  old 
man  found  his  hands  full  in  trying  to  tame  these  irrepressi 
ble  tomboys.  If  he  tied  them  up  in  the  barn  and  whipped 
them  cruelly,  it  did  no  good.  Their  spirits  triumphed  over 
every  obstacle.  There  were  hours  when  he  stood  over 
them  switch  in  hand  to  make  them  sweep  and  wash  ;  but 
the  greater  part  of  the  day,  when  he  was  necessarily 
absent  about  his  affairs,  they  devoted  to  the  pure  un 
bridled  spirit  of  mischief.  Like  Lady  Teazle,  they  rode 
the  old  dock-tailed  plow-horse  around  the  pasture  bare 
backed  and  boy  fashion,  one  behind  the  other,  making 
the  poor  brute  gallop  furiously,  until  one  day  she  stum 
bled,  and  the  youngest  girl  fell  off  and  broke  her  arm. 
Old  Peter  set  the  bone  himself,  being  what  is  called  in 
the  country  a  natural  bone-setter.  He  did  all  the  doctor 
ing  in  his  family  with  roots  and  herbs  which  he  gathered 
in  the  fields  and  brewed  in  his  own  way.  He  had  never 
been  known  to  call  in  a  physician,  except  at  the  last 
moment  of  his  wife's  existence,  when  some  of  his  neigh 
bors  insisted  on  his  securing  medical  advice,  and  then  it 
was  too  late,  and  he  had  the  best  of  reasons  for  not  pay 
ing  the  bill. 

When  Vinnie  was  laid  up  with  her  arm,  Betsy,  or  Peg, 
as  she  was  called,  used  the  interval  of  unwonted  quiet  in 
making  over  one  of  her  mother's  old  gowns.  Dire  neces 
sity  drove  poor  Peg  to  this  effort,  for  she  was  literally  in 
rags.  It  was  almost  the  first  time  in  her  life  that  she 
had  seriously  tried  to  wield  the  needle.  She  had  grown 
all  out  of  such  tattered  things  as  she  possessed,  and  was 
urged  to  diligence  by  an  aching  desire  to  get  into  long 


PEGGY'S   GOWN.  91 

dresses — skirts  sweeping  the  ground  and  trailing  off 
like  a  queen's.  The  gown  was  only  basted  together,  and 
was  probably  the  most  remarkable  piece  of  sewing  and 
fitting  ever  seen.  But  Peg  was  delighted  with  it.  She 
put  it  on  her  back  the  earliest  moment  possible,  and  then 
went  through  all  kinds  of  strides,  attitudes,  woven  paces 
and  measures,  to  show  off  the  long-tailed  gown  to 
Vinnie,  who  lay  envious  and  helpless  in  bed.  But,  being 
so  lightly  put  together,  the  garment  had  a  way  of  burst 
ing  out  in  the  most  unfortunate  places,  and  was  soon 
reduced  to  tatters*.  Every  nail,  and  bush,  and  bramble 
about  the  place  had  some  token  of  Peggy's  long-tailed 
but  short-lived  glory.  A  relative  of  the  mother,  who 
came  at  intervals  to  set  the  house  to  rights  and  look  a 
little  after  the  girls,  found  Peg  clothed,  not  in  sack-cloth 
and  ashes,  but  the  next  thing  to  it — in  one  of  old  Peter's 
linen  dusters. 

Peter  tolerated  the  presence  of  this  woman  because 
she  worked  without  wages  or  hope  of  reward.  She  was 
a  patient  creature,  and  the  girls  could  do  with  her  as  they 
chose.  They  had  not  passed  entirely  out  of  the  doll 
period  when  their  mother  died.  They  still  kept  a  closet 
full  of  rag  infants,  mostly  boys,  and  one  night,  while 
playing  in  this  closet  with  a  lighted  candle,  they  contrived 
to  set  fire  to  the  house,  and  came  near  burning  it  to 
ashes.  After  this  prank  old  Peter  tied  them  up  in  the 
garret,  and  kept  them  a  day  or  two  on  bread  and  water. 
But  they  managed  to  escape  through  a  little  skylight  to 
the  roof  of  the  main  building,  and  by  making  signals  of 
distress  to  a  neighbor's  boy  he  let  them  down  on  a  ladder, 
and  they  escaped  to  the  woods  and  wandered  about  and 
lived  on  blackberries — sleeping  one  night  in  an  old  barn 
— until  hunger  drove  them  home. 

But  the  girls  had  the  best  impulses,  and  might  have 
been  tamed  but  for  their  father's  intolerable  harshness. 
They  gathered  into  their  poor,  starved  affections,  all  the 


92  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

stray,  hungry,  homeless  cats  they  could  find,  and  kept 
them  in  a  room  in  the  barn  until  old  Peter  discovered 
the  cat  hospital,  and  sent  all  the  felines  flying  from  his 
premises  by  means  of  a  savage  dog.  They  were  naturally 
fond  of  flowers,  as  all  women-kind  are  ;  and  one  summer 
a  neighbor  gave  them  seeds  and  they  planted  a  little 
garden,  taking  great  delight  in  the  labor.  The  flowers 
were  mainly  hollyhocks  ;  and  they  came  up  in  great 
profusion  and  blossomed  heartily  after  their  kind.  But 
old  Peter  did  not  believe  in  rubbishy  flowers,  which  have 
no  money  value  and  are  not  good  to  eat.  He  desired  to 
use  the  space  where  the  little  garden  bloomed  so  pathet 
ically  in  a  wilderness  of  weeds,  for  a  bed  of  late  peas,  so 
he  pulled  the  hollyhocks  up  by  the  roots  and  threw  them 
over  the  fence  into  the  road,  where  they  sowed  their 
seeds,  and  the  next  season,  to  revenge  his  grudging 
stinginess,  the  road  was  like  a  path  through  paradise — a 
waste  of  rose  and  white  bloom.  The  young  artist  who 
summers  in  these  parts  made  a  pretty  sketch  of  the  road 
and  the  house  and  the  neglected  garden,  which  I  have 
seen  in  a  city  exhibition.  The  girls  cried  over  their 
flowers  so  ruthlessly  torn  up  and  thrown  out  into  the  sun 
to  die.  It  was  a  symbol  of  the  good  impulses  and 
instincts  in  their  own  natures  uprooted,  nipped  off,  and 
ruined  by  a  brutal,  ignorant  old  man. 

But  a  great  change  was  coming  to  Peter's  wild  girls. 
One  night  he  had  been  violently  angry  with  them  over 
some  small  waste  he  had  detected  in  the  kitchen,  and 
going  to  bed  in  a  passion,  died  before  morning  from  a 
sudden  stroke.  It  had  long  been  surmised  that  the  old 
man  was  possessed  of  considerable  property,  but  the 
extent  of  his  riches  had  not  been  suspected.  On  search 
being  made  by  the  public  officers,  bonds,  stocks,  and 
gold  were  found  hidden  in  the  bed-tick  and  in  odd  cor 
ners.  Suddenly  it  was  discovered  that  Vinnie  and  Peg 
were  likely  to  be  accounted  heiresses,  and  kind  friends 


TOM  HOYS    TRANSFORMED.  93 

soon  came  forward  to  take  them  in  hand.  They  were 
speedily  dressed  in  civilized  black  garments,  their  elf 
locks  brushed  out  and  neatly  braided,  and  their  gipsy 
skins  washed  to  perfect  cleanliness.  They  were  both 
pretty  girls,  and  "pretty  behaved  "  they  became  in  time 
when  they  had  been  sent  to  school  for  three  years  in  a 
distant  city.  We  now  learn  they  have  turned  out  fine 
young  women.  Vinnie  is  a  belle,  much  admired  for  her 
beauty,  and  Peg,  of  all  things  in  the  world,  has  become 
literary. 


CHAPTER  XL 

THE     VILLAGE    POST-MISTRESS. 

village  is  an  exceptionally  good  place  for  the 
1  few  workmen  it  can  support.  Living  is  cheap, 
rents  are  low,  the  people  are  friendly.  The  library  and 
public  school  and  lyceum  course  are  open  to  every  body. 
It  is  the  pride  of  the  village  that  it  has  an  excellent  small 
class  of  Irish  citizens  who  live  in  comparative  comfort, 
possess  a  degree  of  self-respect,  and  are  not  too  much 
given  to  bad  politics  and  worse  whisky.  Politically  they 
are  all  of  one  complexion,  but  as  yet  there  are  no  rings, 
no  bosses,  no  corruption  fund.  The  whisky,  if  ob 
tained  at  all,  is  taken  surreptitiously,  and  though  some 
is  undoubtedly  consumed  in  the  town,  the  Irish  are  not 
the  only  thirsty  souls  who  break  the  laws  and  fall  into 
the  deep  disgrace  of  "jim-jams."  The  younger  genera 
tion  of  Irish  boys  and  girls  have  had  great  influence 
over  their  parents.  Many  of  them  have  been  educated 
in  the  public  schools.  Some  of  the  girls  have  learned 
trades,  some  have  gone  into  the  best  families  as  house- 
servants,  have  been  helped  and  tapught  by  kind  mis 
tresses,  and  have  proved  valuable  factors  in  the  political 
economy  of  the  village.  One  or  two  of  the  prettiest  and 
smartest  have  married  young  farmers  and  gone  west. 

Tim  McCoy  was  a  soldier  in  the  war  of  the  rebellion. 
A  red-haired,  freckle-faced  lad  of  eighteen,  he  shoul 
dered  a  gun  and  marched  away  south,  where  he  was 
wounded  in  the  battle  of  Antietam,  and  sent  home  on  a 
furlough.  Tim  married  and  reared  a  large  family.  He 
could  earn  about  four  hundred  dollars  a  year  as  a 
stone-mason,  and  the  little  pension  swelled  his  in- 


TIM'S  ESTABLISHMENT.  95 

come  to  near  five  hundred  dollars.  Tim  bought 
and  managed  partly  to  pay  for  the  small  bare  house 
and  garden-plot  where  he  lives  down  near  the  rail 
way.  There  was  still  a  small  mortgage  on  the  place, 
and  with  his  strong  shoulder  to  the  wheel,  and  his  good 
wife's  help,  he  expected  season  after  season  to  lift  it  off. 
But  that  last  rise  of  ground  was  always  too  much  for 
him.  Sickness  or  slack  work  came  repeatedly  to  bowl 
him  down.  But  Tim  always  kept  a  light  heart  in  his 
bosom  and  a  whistle  on  his  lips,  on  his  homely  face  a  ray 
of  Irish  sunshine,  and  his  speech  well  larded  with  the 
mother  wit  of  his  nation.  Tim  never  drank  whisky. 
He  was  always  content  after  his  day's  work  to  sit  in  his 
shirt  sleeves  on  the  small  porch  of  his  house,  minding 
the  baby  (there  was  always  a  baby)  and  smoking  his 
clay  pipe.  The  "  childers  "  played  in  the  dirt,  and  his 
wife  bustled  about  among  the  pots  and  pans  in  the 
kitchen.  Mrs.  McCoy  took  in  washing  when  there  were 
summer  boarders  in  the  village,  and  with  the  little  sum 
thus  gained  she  could  subscribe  for  a  newspaper  and 
dress  the  children  better  on  a  Sunday  than  some  other 
folks  dressed  theirs. 

Mary  McCoy,  the  eldest  girl,  was  very  pretty — tall, 
with  rosy  cheeks,  free  from  freckles  or  sunburn,  and  dark 
hair  curling  in  small  close  rings  about  her  temples. 
Mary's  clothes,  though  of  cheap  material,  fitted  well,  and 
they  had  a  certain  style  some  richer  girls  might  have 
envied.  But,  more  than  all,  at  fourteen,  Mary  proved  to 
be  the  best  scholar  in  the  public  school.  She  was  quite 
a  mathematical  prodigy,  and  had  gone  ahead  of  a  large 
class  of  boys  in  algebra.  The  village  always  took  an 
interest  in  the  best  scholar  ;  and  when  it  was  known  that 
Tim  McCoy's  girl  was  going  to  carry  off  all  the  prizes 
that  year,  there  was  quite  a  little  stir  even  among  the 
most  refined  and  aristocratic  families.  On  exhibition 
day  the  school-room  was  crowded  to  overflowing.  Tim 


96  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

McCoy  was  there  with  a  great  spread  of  cotton  shirt- 
collar  up  about  his  big  ears,  sitting  quite  on  the  front  bench, 
his  elbows  well  squared,  feeling  he  had  a  pretty  tough 
job  of  work  to  get  through  with  in  spite  of  the  pride  in 
his  heart.  His  wife  was  sitting  beside  him  in  her  best 
shawl  and  bonnet,  quite  nervous  for  a  woman  who  never 
knew  she  had  nerves,  and  all  the  little  McCoys  were 
ranged  along  in  a  row,  just  ready  to  burst  their  buttons 
to  think  of  the  honor  their  family  had  attained.  Mary 
appeared  in  a  white  cambric  gown  with  a  blue  sash,  and 
was  so  pretty,  and  discreet,  and  modest,  and  wise  withal, 
every  body  was  loud  in  her  praises.  She  was  undeniably 
the  best  scholar  of  the  school,  one  of  the  best  the  village 
had  ever  turned  out.  The  parson  noticed  pretty  little  Mary 
most  affably.  The  judge,  who  was  one  of  the  school  ex 
aminers,  condescended  to  beam  upon  her.  But  the  doc 
tor,  as  usual,  was  the  one  who  bestirred  himself  to  render 
efficient  help. 

He  obtained  a  place  for  Mary  in  the  State  Normal 
School,  first  as  a  kind  of  servant  and  pupil,  and  later  as 
under-teacher  ;  and  Mary  in  a  few  years  was  educated 
far  away  from  the  little  house  on  the  railroad,  with  the 
hennery  and  the  pig-sty.  Poor  Mary  !  she  found  her  life 
at  home  terribly  dislocated  and  incongruous  when  she 
had  acquired  seeing  eyes  and  a  new  consciousness  of  her 
family  and  surroundings.  There  were  times  when  in  her 
bitterness  of  spirit  she  felt  that  it  would  have  been  kinder 
to  have  left  her  in  that  sphere  of  life  in  which  she  was 
born — left  her  just  to  drudge  along  with  her  mother  and 
the  children  in  that  stuffy  little  house,  until  she  had  mar 
ried  a  mechanic  or  farm  hand,  and  begun  the  ceaseless, 
hopeless  round  of  toil  in  her  own  poor  home. 

But  she  was  now  completely  out  of  that  sphere.  The 
only  thing  left  for  the  best  scholar  in  the  high-school  was 
to  go  away  as  far  as  possible  from  the  village  and  the  hum 
ble  relations  whom  she  loved,  and  strike  out  for  herself. 


FAMILY  MISFORTUNES.  97 

So  she  accepted  a  position  as  teacher  in  another  State, 
and  for  a  time  we  saw  her  but  seldom.  Tim  McCoy  was 
a  modest  fellow.  He  was  never  heard  to  boast  of  his 
achievements  in  the  war,  where  he  got  an  ugly  wound. 
But  he  did  brag  a  little  about  his  clever  girl,  who  was  to 
pay  off  the  mortgage  on  the  house,  and  educate  the  chil 
dren,  and  lift  the  family  of  McCoy  to  a  high  notch  on 
the  social  scale.  Mary  had  ceased  to  be  a  Roman  Cath 
olic,  and  that  was  a  grievance  to  her  mother.  There  is 
a  small  chapel  in  the  village,  but  no  resident  priest. 
Mass  is  celebrated  once  a  month,  by  a  priest  from  a 
neighboring  town.  Tim  and  his  wife  Bridget  were 
devout  worshipers  in  this  humble  place,  where  they 
kneeled  on  the  floor  before  the  altar,  crossed  themselves, 
counted  their  beads,  and  said  their  prayers  in  meekness 
and  lowliness  of  heart.  Poor  old  Bridget,  in  her  dim  way, 
thought  education  like  playing  with  fire — delightful  but 
dangerous  ;  if  it  upset  the  worship  of  the  Holy  Virgin  and 
the  blessed  saints  in  the  soul,  it  ought  to  have  great  com 
pensating  advantages  in  the  way  of  worldly  prosperity. 
She  believed  as  firmly  as  Tim  did  that  Mary  was  to  make 
the  fortunes  of  the  family. 

And  so  she  might  perhaps  if  ill-luck  had  not  struck  the 
little  house  on  the  railroad  a  staggering  blow.  Bridget 
caught  a  bad  fall  and  broke  one  or  two  ribs,  and  she 
finally  died  of  internal  injuries.  Tim  was  seized  with  in 
flammatory  rheumatism  and  could  not  turn  over  in  bed, 
and  the  oldest  boy  Dennis  had  run  wild  and  was  in 
danger  of  taking  to  bad  courses  ;  so  Mary  was  sent  for 
to  come  home  and  take  charge  of  her  deeply-afflicted 
family,  and  one  day  there  stepped  out  of  the  train  at  the 
station  a  tall,  trim,  handsome  girl  dressed  all  in  black. 
Aside  from  the  natural  grief  which  Mary  felt  for  her 
mother's  death,  it  was  sad  for  so  nice  a  girl,  who  had 
imbibed  all  the  refined  and  delicate  feelings  of  cultivated 
life,  to  be  doomed  to  surfer  imprisonment  in  that  house 


98  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

on  the  railroad,  with  the  children  and  the  pig  ;  but  she 
behaved  nobly,  and  took  the  tenderest  care  of  her  sick 
father,  and  reformed  the  domestic  economy  of  the  whole 
place.  The  village  admired  and  pitied  her,  and,  more 
than  all,  our  doctor  felt  that  something  must  be  done 
for  her.  Mary's  social  position  was  very  equivocal,  not 
to  say  painful.  The  girls  she  had  known  in  school  could 
not  meet  her  now  on  equal  terms,  and  therefore  shunned 
her.  The  best  families  had  never  taken  up  Irish  me 
chanics'  daughters  for  pets  and  intimates  ;  it  was  against 
all  the  traditions.  Mary  might  have  taught  in  the  high- 
school,  but  the  school  children  knew  her  little  Irish  broth 
ers  and  sisters,  and  might  not  have  the  grace  to  respect 
her  authority.  So  the  best  scholar  the  village  had  turned 
out  and  the  most  unfortunate  person  in  its  bounds  was 
left  pretty  much  to  herself  and  her  crushing  troubles. 

About  this  time  a  new  administration  had  taken  the  reins 
of  government  at  Washington.  There  had  been  a  great 
political  revolution  quietly  wrought,  and  a  new-old  party 
had  again  come  into  power.  Petty  officials  who  had  been 
warm  and  snug  in  their  berths  a  great  many  years  now 
began  to  tremble  and  shake  in  their  shoes.  Tim  McCoy, 
both  by  birth  and  tradition,  belonged  to  the  party  now  in 
the  ascendant.  A  few  of  his  friends,  seeing  the  straits  to 
which  he  was  reduced,  began  to  agitate  for  a  change  in 
the  village  post-office,  and  the  name  of  Mary  McCoy  was 
brought  prominently  forward  for  the  place.  She  was  a 
soldier's  daughter,  an  excellent  accountant,  and  a  worthy 
woman  with  a  large  family  of  helpless  relatives  on  her 
hands.  The  doctor,  though  ranged  on  the  other  side  in 
his  political  affiliations,  was  supposed  to  have  given  Mary 
McCoy  all  his  influence.  A  petition  was  numerously 
signed  in  the  village  begging  that  she  might  be  made 
post-mistress. 

There  was  nothing  to  be  said  against  Ferdinand  Wil- 
kins,  the  incumbent,  except  that  he  was  an  offensive  par- 


"  AY  MEMORIAM:*  99 

tisan.  If  that  means  any  thing,  it  did  not  weigh  with  the 
villagers.  He  was  well-to-do,  had  a  nice  place  free  from 
debt,  and  had  held  the  office  for  ten  years.  It  was  felt 
that  he  ought  to  make  way  for  a  soldier's  daughter,  a 
much  burdened,  needy  woman.  But  Wilkins  had  no  idea 
of  yielding  without  a  struggle.  He  had  grown  to  the 
place,  so  to  speak,  and  felt  he  had  a  sacred,  inborn  right 
to  retain  it  for  the  rest  of  his  life.  Wilkins  was  a  poet 
aster  and  somewhat  of  a  dandy.  He  kept  growing  plants 
and  a  canary  bird  in  the  post-office,  and  was  an  authority 
on  gloves  and  perfumes.  When  St.  Patty  celebrated  her 
birthday  Ferdinand  composed  an  ode  for  the  occasion, 
which  increased  his  local  fame.  His  wife  had  died  a  year 
previous  to  the  time  of  which  I  write,  and  Ferdinand, 
urged  by  the  pressure  of  grief,  composed  an  elegy  called 
"  In  Memoriam,"  which,  however,  did  not  in  the  remotest 
way  suggest  the  great  work  of  the  Laureate.  It  is  prob 
able  that  Ferdinand,  carried  away  by  poetic  frenzy  joined 
to  great  grief,  did  breathe  out  vows  of  eternal  fidelity  to 
one  dead  idol,  but  few  men  are  capable  of  fulfilling.  Fer 
dinand  published  the  poem  at  his  own  cost  in  a  neat 
pamphlet,  and  handed  it  out  of  the  little  window  in  the 
post-office  with  the  mails  to  all  the  villagers. 

There  was  a  person  living  in  the  village,  an  opinionated, 
pragmatical,  well-to  do  old  gentleman  named  Spengler, 
who  was  very  much  affected  by  "  In  Memorian."  We  all 
have  our  hobbies,  and  Spengler's  hobby  was  that  it  is 
irreligious,  immoral,  and  wicked  to  marry  twice.  He  was 
so  bitterly  opposed  to  second  marriages  that  the  village 
had  a  standing  joke  that  if  Spengler  could  find  a  nice 
widow  as  much  opposed  to  them  as  he  was,  he  would 
probably  propose  to  her.  We  named  him  the  perpetual 
widower.  A  man  of  this  kind,  who  has  hugged  his  lone 
liness  and  solitude  for  twenty  years,  and  gloried  in  it  as 
a  work  of  supererogation,  by  which  he  is  laying  up  treas 
ure  in  heaven,  is  of  very  little  account  for  romantic  and 


loo  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

exhilarating  purposes  in  a  small  village,  and  the  women 
voted  him  a  hopeless  old  fogy.  When  the  burning  ques 
tion  of  the  post-office  came  up,  Spengler  espoused  Ferdi 
nand's  cause  with  ardor.  Although  he  had  always  stood 
on  the  side  of  the  Irish  contingent,  he  now  headed  a 
petition  in  favor  of  the  incumbent,  and  actually  set  off  to 
Washington  carrying  the  petition  in  one  pocket  and  "  In 
Memoriam  "  in  the  other,  to  bore  the  representatives  of 
his  district  on  the  subject  of  the  local  post-office. 

I  suppose  there  was  no  name  on  earth  Ferdinand  Wil- 
kins  hated  as  he  did  that  of  Mary  McCoy.  He  had  not 
seen  her  since  her  early  girlhood,  and  had  forgotten  all 
about  her,  but  he  hated  her  on  general  principles.  Mary, 
on  the  other  hand,  knew  him  very  well  by  sight,  and  one 
day  she  chanced  to  meet  him  exactly  in  the  middle  of  the 
walk  in  front  of  Drusilla's  old  house.  He  saw  only  a 
pretty  girl  in  a  very  neatly  fitting  black  gown,  and  with 
such  a  figure  and  face  as  scarcely  could  be  matched  in 
the  village,  and  not  dreaming  of  Mary  McCoy,  he  half 
stopped  from  curiosity  and  admiration.  She  stopped 
wholly,  blushing  and  half  afraid,  but  longing  to  tell  him 
how  sorry  she  was  that  any  trouble  had  come  up  concern 
ing  the  post-office — how  she  would  withdraw  if  her  friends 
would  let  her.  Then,  in  an  instant,  when  she  began  her 
timid  little  speech,  he  knew  it  was  Mary  McCoy.  He 
probably  did  not  hate  her  a  bit  the  less  for  being  pretty, 
but  he  did  seize  the  opportunity  to  reason  with  her,  to 
show  her  how  wicked  and  wrong  it  was  of  her  to  wish  to 
oust  him  from  the  post-office,  which  he  had  reorganized 
on  a  strictly  civil-service  principle,  the  principle  that  a 
good  man  once  in  should  stay  in  until  he  dies.  He  even 
walked  with  her  a  half  mile  or  more  out  of  the  village  as 
he  went  on  in  his  tonguey,  fluent  way  to  show  her  the 
enormity  of  her  position.  Poor  Mary  had  little  to  say 
for  herself,  but  the  next  day  she  wrote  Ferdinand  a  few 
lines,  saying  she  had  about  made  up  her  mind  to  with- 


THE   COMPROMISE.  IOI 

draw  from  the  contest,  to  which  he  replied  that  on  think 
ing  of  it  over  night  he  had  concluded  to  get  out  of  the 
office  before  he  was  thrust  out  by  the  ingratitude  of  a  cold 
world  in  general  and  of  the  villagers  in  particular.  He 
also  conveyed  a  hint  of  the  fact  that  he  was  an  unappre 
ciated  genius. 

So  the  two  enemies  rested  for  a  time,  but  they  met  on 
several  occasions,  and  took  long  walks  on  Burying- 
Ground  Hill  and  out  toward  Saddleback,  that  Ferdinand, 
who  had  now  assumed  the  pose  of  the  generous,  self- 
devoted  martyr,  might  instruct  Mary  in  the  duties  of  the 
office.  A  great  deal  of  instruction  seemed  requisite, 
and,  strange  to  say,  no  one  in  the  village  gained  an  ink 
ling  of  what  was  going  on.  Ferdinand  never  entered 
Mary's  home,  but  they  both  needefl  long  rambles  to  work 
off  the  suspense  and  excitement  of  the  situation. 

One  night  they  were  walking  under  an  umbrella  just 
at  dusk.  It  was  a  soft-dropping  spring  rain  that  brings 
the  odors  forth  from  the  grass  and  swells  the  buds 
moment  by  moment.  They  had  not  yet  heard  from  the 
capital,  but  a  great  reconciling  idea  had  come  into  Fer 
dinand's  head,  striking  well  through  the  pomade  and  the 
glossy  locks.  He  proposed  a  compromise.  He  said, 
although  he  had  once  disliked  the  idea  of  her  very  much, 
he  now  hated  to  look  on  Mary  as  an  enemy.  It  was  an 
anomalous  and  strained  position.  Naturally  they  ought 
to  be  allies  and  the  dearest  of  friends.  If  she  had  been 
in  the  wrong,  he  was  willing  to  forgive.  If  Mary  felt  she 
had  a  grievance,  he  hoped  some  ground  of  amity  and 
mutual  good  will  might  be  reached.  After  awhile  he 
proposed  a  plan. 

Mary  did  not  answer  directly.  She  gently  turned 
into  another  road,  and  going  down  to  the  poor  Irish 
quarter  of  the  town,  they  stopped  under  the  flare  of  an 
oil  lamp,  where,  through  the  soft  shadows,  could  be  seen 
the  open  door  of  Tim  McCoy's  house.  Tim  was  still 


102  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

feeble  and  bent,  but  he  had  crept  out  to  breathe  the 
fresh  air,  with  his  youngest  boy  on  his  knee.  His  head 
had  dropped  on  his  breast,  and  the  fire  had  gone  out  in 
his  pipe.  He  was  thinking  of  Bridget,  and  he  looked 
broken  and  old. 

Mary's  voice  was  very  husky  and  sounded  strangely  in 
her  own  ears.  "  No  one  can  take  me  who  does  not  take 
him  and  the  children.  You  would  be  ashamed  of  them. 
Good-by." 

He  caught  her  hand  and  kept  it.  "  I  will  be  good  to 
them,  Mary.  They  shall  be  like  my  own."  For  once 
Ferdinand  rose  to  the  height  of  a  moral  hero. 

They  had  been  married  a  few  days  when  old  Mr. 
Spengler  came  back  from  Washington.  Mary  was  in 
the  back  office  with  the  plants  and  the  canary  bird 
making  up  the  quarterly  account.  Old  Spengler  looked 
weary  and  travel-stained,  and  he  said,  softening  his 
voice  to  a  touch  of  sympathy,  when  he  met  Ferdinand  : 
"  We  have  lost  the  battle,  my  boy,  and  I  am  very  sorry. 
The  president,  you  know,  has  sent  in  her  name  for  con 
firmation.  Come  and  stay  awhile  with  me,  and  I  will  try 
to  brace  you  up." 

Ferdinand  blushed  to  the  roots  of  his  pretty  hair, 
feeling  himself  to  be  an  awful  fraud.  He  said  faintly  : 
"  We — that  is,  Miss  McCoy  and  I —  we  have  gone  into  a 
kind  of  partnership  and  I  shall  keep  the  office  after  all." 

Old  Spengler  shut  himself  up  in  his  house  for  several 
days  and  made  an  auto-de-fe  oi  "In  Memonam,"  and 
now  there  is  a  rumor  abroad  that  he  is  looking  out  for  a 
wife.  The  village  women  generally  pity  poor  Mary. 
They  say  she  has  thrown  herself  away  on  a  milksop. 
But  is  it  not  in  accordance  with  a  great  law  of  nature  that 
clever  women  do  generally  throw  themselves  away  on 
milksops  ? 


CHAPTER  XII. 

SAYINGS    AND    DOINGS   OF    MISS   CANDACE. 

I^HE  growing  light  brings  a  new  sense  of  breadth  and 
largeness  out  of  doors.  The  sky  stretches  to  an 
unexpected  size  and  finer  constellations  seem  to  burn  in 
the  evening  heavens.  The  elm  trees  sway  in  the  dry 
wind  tempest,  and  great  shadow  giants  flicker  over  the 
tops  of  the  houses,  and  climb  the  steeple  and  mount  the 
sky.  The  sunrises  are  red  behind  the  fir-trees  on  our 
solemn  eastern  slopes  ;  and  at  evening  the  fading  light 
draws  a  long  sanguinary  finger  and  splashes  warm  on  the 
dullest  gray  wall.  A  thought  of  spring,  inchoate  and 
vague,  tingles  in  the  twigs  of  the  lowland  willows  until 
you  seem  to  see  their  yellow  and  brown  stems  through  a 
quivering  mist  of  green.  At  noon,  for  a  single  relenting 
hour,  the  earth  stretches  itself  like  a  yawning  Titan. 
The  crusted  snow,  dwindled  to  belts  and  patches,  breaks 
loose  from  the  clay  banks,  and  little  rivulets  begin  to 
trickle  down,  making  hieroglyphs  older  than  those  of 
Rameses. 

The  cackling  of  hens  is  now  an  original  sound,  sug 
gestive  of  budding  hopes  and  the  early  resumption  of 
business.  The  house  sparrows  at  work  in  our  elms  begin 
to  cheep  out  the  information  very  early  in  the  morning 
that  spring  has  taken  the  air  line  for  the  village.  At 
night  it  still  freezes  hard,  but  not  as  vindictively  as  of 
old.  A  fresh,  frosty  tingle  nips  fingers  and  ears,  and 
makes  you  think  of  getting  down  the  sap-buckets  and  tap 
ping  the  sugar  maples.  The  winds  still  caper  wildly 
around  old  chimneys  and  casements,  but  they  seem  to 
pipe  in  quite  another  key. 


104  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

We  wait  many  weeks  in  the  bleak  North  for  the  first 
wild-flower  and  the  first  bluebird.  But  they  are  getting 
ready  in  the  great  workshop.  Long  before  they  come  the 
essences  of  flowers  seem  free  and  floating  in  the  sweet, 
cold  air  ;  and  there  is  a  prophecy  of  song  in  the  empty 
woods  that  is  worth  more  than  the  song  itself. 

There  is  a  small  holding  of  land,  not  more  than  ten  or 
fifteen  acres,  just  outside  the  village,  where  the  spring- 
seems  to  come  first.  The  few  old  peach  trees  in  the  gar 
den  get  up  a  show  of  blossoms  before  any  other  spot  has 
thought  of  a  bud  ;  the  grass  breaks  out  into  a  sudden 
glow  of  crocuses  and  lilies  of  the  valley,  when  scarce  a 
dandelion  has  put  forth  elsewhere.  The  early  sun  seems 
to  exhaust  itself  in  nourishing  the  cherry  trees  along  the 
stone  wall  until  they  are  all  a  flutter  with  white  flowers, 
and  only  brings  to  us  its  later  guerdon.  This  warm 
slope  of  land,  with  the  little  brown  house  attached,  by 
several  small  industries,  such  as  the  raising  of  early 
vegetables,  small  fruits,  eggs  and  honey,  has  supported  a 
large  family  for  several  years.  The  father  and  grand 
father  is  a  microscopic  economist,  such  as  can  only  be 
found  in  New  England  and  among  the  French  peasantry. 
Not  a  stick  or  straw  ever  goes  to  waste  on  his  domain, 
consequently  he  is  as  forehanded  as  any  of  his  neighbors 
— always  ready  to  pay  his  doctor's  bill  and  his  pew-rent 
when  due — signs  of  special  grace  in  a  small  neighbor 
hood. 

His  wife  died  years  ago,  and  he  has  been  ably  seconded 
in  all  his  efforts  by  his  daughter,  Candace,  his  house 
keeper  and  general  manager.  The  old  man  has  reared 
two  families,  his  own  and  the  children  of  his  daughter 
Rachel,  who  died  young,  a  widow,  leaving  five  small 
children.  Every  one  in  the  village  knows  Miss  Candace, 
and  every  one  likes  to  welcome  her  ample  person  and 
homely,  honest  face — so  kind  and  open  it  has  been  many 
times  said  she  would  be  properly  named  Candor.  Every 


CANDACE   AXD  HER  HENS.  105 

\vrinkle  and  crow's  foot  and  hollow  and  line,  even  to  the 
mole  on  her  left  cheek,  is  filled  with  wisdom,  goodness 
and  benevolence.  She  is  so  wholesomely  plain  she  is 
positively  attractive,  and  may  well  be  likened  to  mign 
onette  or  lavender,  unobtrusive  but  loved  products  of  our 
gardens.  Miss  Candace  by  birth  belongs  to  the  Society 
of  Friends,  but  she  does  not  speak  the  "  plain  "  language 
nor  wear  the  dress.  She  was  not  educated  after  the 
manner  of  the  schools.  She  reads  very  slowly  and 
peruses  the  same  books  year  by  year.  These  are  the 
Bible,  "John  Woolman's  Journal,"  "  Pilgrim's  Progress," 
and  a  few  others  to  which  very  late  in  life  she  has  added 
"  Emerson's  Essays."  Miss  Candace  is  a  great  author 
ity  on  the  rearing  of  children,  the  raising  and  care  of 
fowls  and  the  cultivation  of  flowers.  No  one  in  the  town 
has  ever  had  half  her  success  in  the  mysteries  of  egg 
production.  When  people  try  to  discover  the  secret,  they 
find  that  she  has  only  an  ordinary  hen-house,  with  no 
patent  laying-boxes  or  special  arrangements  for  coaxing 
the  wary,  unwilling  fowl  to  lay  out  of  season.  Neither 
does  she  pride  herself  on  rare  breeds  or  costly  varieties. 
The  barn-yard  hen,  clucking  in  comfort  and  security,  is 
good  enough  for  her.  She  shows  every  process  of  feed 
ing  in  winter — tells  you  to  keep  your  fowls  warm,  to  give 
them  plenty  of  fresh  water,  gravel  and  lime,  and  that  is 
all.  You  go  home  and  do  just  as  she  directs,  but  her 
eggs  are  always  the  first  in  the  market  ;  they  are  larger 
and  of  a  more  exquisite  pearly  tint  than  yours.  Her 
spring  chickens  are  the  best,  and  will  command  a  higher 
price  even  than  those  raised  by  Rastus  and  his  mother. 

Go  in  when  Miss  Candace  has  done  up  her  morning's 
work,  and  is  resting  in  her  favorite  rocking-chair,  knitting 
in  hand,  and  sit  down  cozily  with  your  knees  close  to  hers, 
and  she  may  let  you  a  little  deeper  into  the  secret 
"  Folks  don't  think  hens  have  feelings,"  she  begins,  "  but 
they  have,  and  they  talk  together  a  good  deal,  and  I 


104  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

We  wait  many  weeks  in  the  bleak  North  for  the  first 
wild-flower  and  the  first  bluebird.  But  they  are  getting 
ready  in  the  great  workshop.  Long  before  they  come  the 
essences  of  flowers  seem  free  and  floating  in  the  sweet, 
cold  air  ;  and  there  is  a  prophecy  of  song  in  the  empty 
woods  that  is  worth  more  than  the  song  itself. 

There  is  a  small  holding  of  land,  not  more  than  ten  or 
fifteen  acres,  just  outside  the  village,  where  the  spring- 
seems  to  come  first.  The  few  old  peach  trees  in  the  gar 
den  get  up  a  show  of  blossoms  before  any  other  spot  has 
thought  of  a  bud  ;  the  grass  breaks  out  into  a  sudden 
glow  of  crocuses  and  lilies  of  the  valley,  when  scarce  a 
dandelion  has  put  forth  elsewhere.  The  early  sun  seems 
to  exhaust  itself  in  nourishing  the  cherry  trees  along  the 
stone  wall  until  they  are  all  a  flutter  with  white  flowers, 
and  only  brings  to  us  its  later  guerdon.  This  warm 
slope  of  land,  with  the  little  brown  house  attached,  by 
several  small  industries,  such  as  the  raising  of  early 
vegetables,  small  fruits,  eggs  and  honey,  has  supported  a 
large  family  for  several  years.  The  father  and  grand 
father  is  a  microscopic  economist,  such  as  can  only  be 
found  in  New  England  and  among  the  French  peasantry. 
Not  a  stick  or  straw  ever  goes  to  waste  on  his  domain, 
consequently  he  is  as  forehanded  as  any  of  his  neighbors 
— always  ready  to  pay  his  doctor's  bill  and  his  pew-rent 
when  due — signs  of  special  grace  in  a  small  neighbor 
hood. 

His  wife  died  years  ago,  and  he  has  been  ably  seconded 
in  all  his  efforts  by  his  daughter,  Candace,  his  house 
keeper  and  general  manager.  The  old  man  has  reared 
two  families,  his  own  and  the  children  of  his  daughter 
Rachel,  who  died  young,  a  widow,  leaving  five  small 
children.  Everyone  in  the  village  knows  Miss  Candace, 
and  every  one  likes  to  welcome  her  ample  person  and 
homely,  honest  face — so  kind  and  open  it  has  been  many 
times  said  she  would  be  properly  named  Candor.  Every 


S   CAXDACE   AXD  HER  HENS.  105 

wrinkle  and  crow's  foot  and  hollow  and  line,  even  to  the 
mole  on  her  left  cheek,  is  filled  with  wisdom,  goodness 
and  benevolence.  She  is  so  wholesomely  plain  she  is 
positively  attractive,  and  may  well  be  likened  to  mign 
onette  or  lavender,  unobtrusive  but  loved  products  of  our 
gardens.  Miss  Candace  by  birth  belongs  to  the  Society 
of  Friends,  but  she  does  not  speak  the  "  plain  "  language 
nor  wear  the  dress.  She  was  not  educated  after  the 
manner  of  the  schools.  She  reads  very  slowly  and 
peruses  the  same  books  year  by  year.  These  are  the 
Bible,  "John  Woolman's  Journal,"  "Pilgrim's  Progress," 
and  a  few  others  to  which  very  late  in  life  she  has  added 
"  Emerson's  Essays."  Miss  Candace  is  a  great  author 
ity  on  the  rearing  of  children,  the  raising  and  care  of 
fowls  and  the  cultivation  of  flowers.  No  one  in  the  town 
has  ever  had  half  her  success  in  the  mysteries  of  egg 
production.  When  people  try  to  discover  the  secret,  they 
find  that  she  has  only  an  ordinary  hen-house,  with  no 
patent  laying-boxes  or  special  arrangements  for  coaxing 
the  wary,  unwilling  fowl  to  lay  out  of  season.  Neither 
does  she  pride  herself  on  rare  breeds  or  costly  varieties. 
The  barn-yard  hen,  clucking  in  comfort  and  security,  is 
good  enough  for  her.  She  shows  every  process  of  feed 
ing  in  winter — tells  you  to  keep  your  fowls  warm,  to  give 
them  plenty  of  fresh  water,  gravel  and  lime,  and  that  is 
all.  You  go  home  and  do  just  as  she  directs,  but  her 
eggs  are  always  the  first  in  the  market  ;  they  are  larger 
and  of  a  more  exquisite  pearly  tint  than  yours.  Her 
spring  chickens  are  the  best,  and  will  command  a  higher 
price  even  than  those  raised  by  Rastus  and  his  mother. 

Go  in  when  Miss  Candace  has  done  up  her  morning's 
work,  and  is  resting  in  her  favorite  rocking-chair,  knitting 
in  hand,  and  sit  down  cozily  with  your  knees  close  to  hers, 
and  she  may  let  you  a  little  deeper  into  the  secret 
"  Folks  don't  think  hens  have  feelings,"  she  begins,  "  but 
they  have,  and  they  talk  together  a  good  deal,  and  I 


io8  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

children.  Look  at  my  plants  there  filling  the  windows 
with  their  great  stocky  shoots  and  healthy  leaves.  I've 
a  notion  they  wouldn't  grow  where  there's  envy,  hatred, 
and  malice,  and  all  uncharitableness.  I  guess  back 
biting  and  evil  speaking  would  kill  'em  as  soon  as  coal 
gas  ;  but  they  ain't  half  as  sensitive  as  the  mind  of  a 
child.  We  must  get  into  the  nature  of  roses  and  gera 
niums  and  try  to  learn  the  best  conditions  for  them, 
and  that's  about  all  there  is  in  raising  hens  or  children. 
The  method  requires  a  deal  of  patience,  a  kind  of  divine 
unselfishness  strained  and  clarified  like  the  best  honey. 
If  you've  got  a  weakly  plant,  nurse  it  and  give  it  richer 
earth,  more  air  and  sun.  It  may  in  time  bear  blossoms 
that  will  take  the  prize  at  the  flower-show.  Don't  ever 
be  discouraged  with  an  unlikely  boy  or  girl,  but  study 
out  what  it  needs,  and  try,  and  keep  trying,  and  by  and 
by  you  will  hit  on  the  right  thing  to  bring  that  weakly 
one  along  where  he  can  begin  to  grow.  If  you  love  him 
enough,  he  may  some  day  stand  at  the  head  of  the  life 
class.  I  always  say  folks  are  like  pitchers  :  there  is  a 
handle  to  every  disposition  if  we  only  knew  how  to 
take  hold  of  it.  Plenty  of  folks  fail  to  influence  their 
children  because  they  get  tired  searching  for  that 
handle." 

I  have  gathered  up  a  few  of  Miss  Candace's  miscella 
neous  sayings  which  are  scattered  among  the  neighbors, 
and  these  not  the  best  : 

"  There  are  some  folks  like  a  hill  of  potatoes  :  all  the 
green  part  and  the  blows  must  die  away  or  get  killed  by 
frost-bite  before  you  find  there  is  any  thing  worth  digging 
for  underneath." 

"  There  are  folks  like  the  scrub  oak  :  they  never  know 
when  to  shed  their  leaves.  I  hate  to  see  dried-up  youth 
ful  follies  and  vanities  hanging  on  to  old  people." 

"  There's  some  sugar  in  a  corn-stalk,  and  I  expect 
there's  about  as  much  sweetness  in  the  dryest  stick  of  a 


HOW  MISS  C AND  ACE   BEAKS  TESTIMONY.        109 

human  being.  It's  our  loss  if  we  don't  know  how  to  ex 
tract  it." 

"  I  hear  a  good  deal  said  about  living  with  the  saints 
and  angels,  but  when  I  go  to  the  other  world  I  want  to 
go  to  my  own  folks.  I  can  feel  with  humanity,  but  I  don't 
know  nothing  at  all  about  angelmanity." 

"  If  you  believe  in  your  work,  your  work  will  believe 
in  you.  If  you  are  a  sham,  your  work  will  kick  like  an 
old  rusty  gun." 

Miss  Candace  believes  in  the  licensed  order  of  women 
preachers  and  in  the  custom  among  the  Friends 
of  bearing  testimony  against  certain  things  which 
call  for  reformation.  Her  testimony,  borne  vigor 
ously  against  intemperance,  has  had  a  great  deal  to  do 
with  driving  the  gin-shops  from  the  town.  She  is  never 
exigent  ;  her  voice  is  placid  and  pleasantly  modulated. 
She  never  has  been  insulted  or  rebuffed  even  by  rough 
men  under  the  influence  of  drink.  She  is  always  guided 
by  high  motives,  and  her  words  go  directly  to  the  point. 
It  is  her  conviction  that  we  must  not  let  "  folks  "  alone  ; 
that  we  have  no  right  to  ignore  the  spiritual  and  tempo 
ral  needs  of  our  neighbors,  or  to  shut  ourselves  up  in  a 
cold  sense  of  isolation  and  superior  virtue,  when  we  may 
have  a  message  hidden  in  the  heart  that  is  needed  by 
some  fellow-being. 

From  time  immemorial  there  has  been  a  class  of  exhort 
ing  women  in  the  village,  who  at  certain  seasons  have  felt 
called  upon  gratuitously  to  attend  to  the  spiritual  inter 
ests  of  their  neighbors.  They  have  grown  less  in  the 
course  of  years,  but  there  is  always  some  one  left  to  assume 
the  mantle  of  prophetess  and  itinerant  religious  preacher. 
Mother  Embery  is  an  old,  bent  woman  of  vinegar  aspect, 
who  for  a  great  many  years  has  believed  herself  in  a 
state  of  sanctification  and  incapable  of  committing  sin. 
This  happy  immunity  from  personal  guilt  has  left  her 
free  to  sit  pretty  heavily  in  judgment  on  her  neighbors. 


no  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

She  lives  in  a  lonely  little  hollow  outside  the  town,  and 
long  ago,  before  she  was  "  sanctified,"  she  believed  she 
saw  the  Evil  One,  horns  and  all,  looking  in  at  her  sitting- 
room  window.  In  recent  times  the  anthropomorphic 
Satan  has  grown  rather  unpopular  among  us,  and  Mother 
Embery  is  shy  of  talking  about  this  remarkable  expe 
rience.  But  she  occasionally  makes  house-to-house 
visitations  of  personal  inquiry  as  to  the  spiritual  condi 
tion  of  the  family,  talking  with  each  one  of  the  inmates, 
and  offering  prayer  if  it  is  allowed.  Some  resent  her  in 
terference  and  shut  their  doors  against  her,  others  toler 
ate  her  presence  though  it  be  unwelcome,  and  a  few 
receive  her  as  a  chosen  vessel  of  grace  and  an  inspired 
ministrant.  On  one  occasion,  immediately  following  a 
revival  in  the  village,  when  Mother  Embery's  brain  was  a 
good  deal  exalted,  she  went  into  Aunt  Dido's  to  inquire 
after  the  state  of  her  soul.  That  invincible  optimist  re 
plied  pleasantly  that  she  hadn't  heard  from  her  soul 
for  some  time,  she  was  sorry  to  say  ;  she  had  been  so 
busy  taking  care  of  the  bodies  of  other  people.  She 
presumed,  however,  it  was  all  right.  Mother  Embery 
was  not  well  pleased  with  this  practical  answer  from  a 
person  whom  she  felt  to  be  in  the  very  gall  of  bitterness. 
She  therefore  poured  forth  warning  and  admonition  in  an 
impetuous  stream  of  words,  delivered  in  a  high  key,  and 
finally  wound  up  by  asking  Aunt  Dido  what  she  would 
say  when  she  came  into  a  dreadful  place  where  the  fire 
is  never  quenched.  Aunt  Dido  was  busy  making  mince 
pies,  weighing  and  portioning  out  the  fruit  and  meat,  the 
raisins  and  citron,  and  spices,  and  did  not  wish  to  be 
bothered.  So,  standing  at  her  kitchen  table,  she  turned 
her  head  over  her  shoulder  and  said  good-humoredly  : 

"  Don't  know  what  I  should  say,  Mother  Embery, 
under  those  circumstances.  Guess  I  should  warm  my 
hands  and  remark,  as  an  old  lady  did  I  once  heard  of, 
'What  a  particularly  nice  fire  to  broil  a  steak  ! ' ' 


MOTHER    EM  BERTS    WRATH.  ll1 

Mother  Embery  flung  out  of  the  house,  shocked  by 
such  unpardonable  levity,  and  since  that  day  she  has  had 
the  utmost  satisfaction  in  consigning  Aunt  Dido  to  the 
place  where  Dante  bestowed  all  his  political  enemies. 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

THE      BUSY      BEES. 

OUR  spring  high  water  and  freshets  are  always  periods 
of  great  interest  and  excitement,  especially  to  the 
children.  The  river  is  sure  to  rise  at  about  the  same 
time  every  year.  There  comes  a  warm,  impetuous  rain 
storm  and  then  an  ice-break.  The  snow  melts  rapidly  on 
the  mountains.  The  brooks  rush  down  and  pour  into 
the  larger  streams.  A  rush  and  roar  and  trampling  of 
waters  fill  the  world  with  a  new  spirit.  For  a  few  days 
there  is  great  anxiety  lest  the  dams  should  break  and  the 
bridges  be  carried  off.  People  are  set  to  watch  day  and 
night  at  different  points  while  the  crisis  lasts,  for  fear  the 
village,  which  lies  on  a  low  plateau,  should  be  invaded  by 
a  mountain  torrent.  But  this  has  never  happened  within 
memory.  In  a  short  time  the  river  ceases  to  rage  and 
boil,  and  spreads  out  peacefully  in  lake-like  expanses 
over  the  meadows,  where  fresh-water  birds  come  promptly 
to  feed. 

Mill  Farm  is  always  a  point  of  attraction  in  freshet  time. 
Then  the  wine-colored  and  golden-brown  water  rushes 
over  the  wheel  and  through  the  race,  and  churns  along 
the  stony  brook  in  foam  until  it  finally  makes  a  leap 
down  the  three  giant  steps  of  rock,  clearing  them  at  a 
bound  with  a  shout.  The  fall  throws  off  spray  in  clouds, 
which  cling  like  lace  webs  to  the  rocky  slopes  of  the  glen, 
and  when  the  sun  shines  are  shot  full  of  rainbows.  Mill 
Farm,  with  the  old  gray  stacks  of  buildings,  the  busy 
wheel,  the  water-course  and  the  cascade,  is  the  most  pic 
turesque  place  about  the  village.  The  miller  and  his  wife 


THE  BEES  AT  MILL   FARM.  113 

are  both  round,  jolly,  homespun  people  of  the  true  miller 
type.  When  the  miller  emerges  from  the  dust  raised  by 
his  wheel,  his  rosy  face  beams  like  a  full  moon.  His  wife 
is  of  the  same  build,  short  and  cherubic,  and  is  noted  for 
being  dressy  and  wearing  the  gayest  old-lady  caps  in  the 
village.  The  little  court  between  the  mill  and  the  house 
in  summer  is  filled  with  the  brightest  flowers  that  blow, 
such  as  fish-geraniums,  nasturtiums,  scarlet  beans  and 
poppies.  Even  now  the  sitting-room  windows  make  a 
fine  display  of  hyacinth  glasses. 

But  there  are  other  flowers  looking  out  from  the  win 
dows  and  smiling  into  the  bland  spring  air.  They  are 
the  bright  eyes  and  blooming  faces  of  the  "  Busy  Bees," 
three  young  girls,  nieces  of  the  miller's  wife,  who  come 
frequently  from  a  neighboring  town  to  visit  their  aunt. 
The  old  miller  is  uncommonly  fond  of  these  pretty  girls. 
He  has  no  children  of  his  own  ;  and  it  is  shrewdly  sus 
pected  that  if  they  marry  to  please  him,  he  will  make 
them  his  heirs.  They  are  orphan  girls,  and  already  well 
endowed  for  the  country  with  this  world's  goods.  Indeed 
among  the  simple  minded  inhabitants  of  the  village  they 
are  looked  upon  as  great  matrimonial  prizes.  They  bring 
with  them  Saratoga  trunks  full  of  bewitching  clothes  in 
which  they  array  themselves  ;  and  all  about  the  glen,  and 
the  fields,  and  the  mill  they  pose  to  be  admired.  Each 
of  the  "  Busy  Bees  "  has  her  fad,  which  she  pursues  with 
ardor.  The  eldest  is  practical  and  active,  ready  to  do 
any  thing  in  the  house  or  on  the  farm,  from  concocting  a 
pudding  to  riding  on  the  mowing  machine,  provided  some 
one  of  the  male  kind  is  by  to  admire  her  vigor.  The 
second  is  decorative.  She  brought  old  china  and  art  work 
into  fashion  in  the  village  before  Rose  Madder  opened 
her  studio  above  Peckham's  grocery  store.  She  first 
showed  the  villagers  how  to  compose  nocturnes  and  sym 
phonies  in  plush  and  satin,  Berlin  wool  and  floss  silk. 

The  youngest  Busy  Bee  is  an  entomologist,  to  the  extent 


H4  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

of  catching  butterflies  in  a  green  silk  net  and  looking 
very  pretty  while  she  pursues  science  out  in  the  daisy- 
decked  fields  in  a  bewildering  little  Mother  Hubbard  and 
a  big  straw  hat.  It  is  very  instructive  to  her  young  ad 
mirers  to  see  how  deftly  she  jabs  these  poor  winged  creat 
ures,  arid  puts  them  up  as  specimens  with  a  lovely  smile 
on  her  innocent,  rosy  face.  The  "  Busy  Bees  "  all  unite 
in  adoring  and  patronizing  the  country.  They  dote  on 
sunrises  and  moonlight  nights  in  the  glen,  on  horseback 
excursions  to  Saddleback,  and  walks  to  the  wildest  parts 
of  the  neighborhood.  They  have  a  gipsy  camp  down  by 
the  waterfall,  where  they  spend  whole  days  in  picnic  ex 
istence  and  give  audience  to  the  most  favored  of  their 
male  friends.  They  are  rustic  in  a  way  very  surprising 
to  the  country  girls.  In  their  best  gowns  they  hunt  hens' 
nests  in  the  barn,  or  ride  on  the  hay  load,  or  go  out,  hold 
ing  up  their  dainty  skirts  from  the  reek  of  the  farm-yard, 
to  pet  the  horses  and  cows  and  calves.  They  are  affable 
and  pleasant  to  every  body.  There  is  not  a  creature 
living  they  would  not  like  to  make  happy  if  they  could  do 
it  in  a  picturesque  and  effective  manner. 

When  the  Bees  appear  there  is  constant  stir  and 
bustle,  accompanied  with  cackling,  and  laughter,  and  fun. 
Of  course,  the  advent  of  these  rich,  attractive,  and  desir 
able  damsels  creates  a  commotion  in  the  village.  The 
atmosphere  changes,  and  all  winds  blow  toward  Mill 
Farm.  The  young  men,  old  bachelors,  and  widowers 
"  spruce  up,"  and  turn  their  longing  eyes  in  the  direction 
of  the  glen.  In  some  quarters,  hair  dye  is  in  brisk 
demand.  The  tailor  notes  quite  a  perceptible  increase 
of  orders.  The  bootmaker  laughs  and  says  he  never  sells 
any  patent  leathers  unless  the  "  Busy  Bees  "  are  in  town. 
As  a  spur  to  trade  and  a  quickening  impulse  in  dull  times 
the  Bees  are  always  welcomed  with  open  arms.  When 
they  go  chattering  through  the  village,  showing  their  fine 
feathers,  and  tripping  along  on  the  toes  of  their  French 


AU.VT  DIDO'S  ADVICE    TO  HUGH.  115 

boots,  with  a  following  of  attentive  gallants,  window- 
shades  fly  up,  old  people  hobble  to  the  door,  and  excel 
lent  girls  who  bave  been  allowed  to  hang  upon  the  bush 
unsought  many  a  year  gaze  with  mild  asperity,  feeling  in 
their  inmost  souls  that  the  Bees  "ain't  such  a  great  sight 
better  looking  than  other  folks  ! " 

Hugh  has  flirted  impartially  with  all  three  of  the  Bees, 
as  he  has  found  himself  in  perfect  accord  with  all  their 
tastes.  He  might  possibly  like  to  marry  one  of  them  if 
the  other  two  were  not  just  as  nice  and  just  as  alluring  as 
any  given  member  of  the  trio.  Aunt  Dido  has  advised 
him  seriously  to  pay  attention  to  the  eldest,  who  she 
thinks  has  more  sense  and  is  less  volatile  than  her  sisters. 
She  has  set  forth  the  advantages  of  matrimony  to  her 
boarder  while  wielding  her  large  iron  spoon  over  the 
kitchen  stove,  while  changing  his  plate  at  his  solitary 
dinner,  and  even  while  tidying  the  house  in  her  whirlwind 
fashion  with  broom  and  duster.  It  is  strange  Aunt  Dido 
should  think  so  much  of  the  married  state,  when  her  own 
husband  is  such  a  small,  insignificant  man,  it  almost  takes 
a  microscope  to  discover  him.  But  she  has  the  weakness 
of  her  sex,  which  judges  a  man  married  a  man  made,  and 
tells  Hugh  with  commendable  frankness  that  if  he  settles 
down  into  the  well-worn  groove  of  domestic  life  he  may 
turn  out  a  steady  man  ;  otherwise  she  very  much  fears  he 
never  will  amount  to  any  certain  sum.  Hugh  objected  very 
much  to  having,  as  he  said,  a  bee  put  in  his  bonnet,  but 
once  there  he  could  not  help  its  buzzing.  He  has  tried 
to  look  upon  the  eldest  Bee  as  a  possible  Mrs.  Hugh, 
but  for  the  life  of  him  he  can  not  help  regarding  all 
three  in  an  impersonal  affectionate  manner.  To  quiet 
the  importunities  of  Aunt  Dido,  about  a  year  ago  he 
planned  to  give  the  sisters  a  serenade  at  the  mill  on  a 
lovely  moonlight  night.  The  serenade  was  charming, 
but  it  did  not  turn  out  just  as  it  was  planned,  as  I  shall 
show  later. 


Il6  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

There  is  one  old  bachelor  among  us  who  lives  in  per 
haps  the  snuggest,  tidiest  place  we  have,  just  below  the 
grand  mansion  established  by  Judge  Magnus.  This  man 
has  furnished  more  food  for  harmless  gossip  and  matri 
monial  speculation  than  any  other  man  ever  "raised  "  in 
the  town.  He  is  a  very  shrewd  business  man,  and  has 
amassed  a  large  fortune,  which  it  is  his  ambition  to 
increase.  His  thin,  keen  visage  appears  to  have  been 
ground  fine  on  hard  bargains  and  doubtful  transactions. 
All  the  village  spinsters  know  that  he  dyes  his  hair  and 
whiskers,  which  are  of  a  splendid  sable,  glossy  and  rich 
beyond  the  power  of  nature  to  produce.  When  the  Bees 
are  in  the  village  his  locks  take  on  an  added  luster  beau 
tiful  to  behold.  He  is  mathematically  exact  in  dress  and 
deportment.  His  silk  hat  shines  as  if  just  taken  from  the 
counter,  and  his  gloves  fit  to  perfection.  Impossible  is 
it  to  describe  the  glitter  of  his  linen.  He  has  been 
called  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman,  though  some  who  know 
the  smoothness  of  his  tongue  and  the  grip  of  his  hard 
bargains  think  Mr.  Facing-both-ways  would  be  quite  as 
appropriate.  His  house  always  appears  to  have  just 
received  a  coat  of  new  paint.  Every  thing  about  it  is 
kept  in  perfect  order.  The  most  voracious  insects  never 
dare  to  attack  his  trees  and  vines.  His  roses  are  all 
full-blown  ones  with  just  so  many  leaves  to  the  corolla. 
His  grapes  form  in  the  most  absolute  perfection,  resemb 
ling  those  mouth-watering  clusters  you  see  in  agricultural 
papers.  The  walks  in  his  garden  and  door-yard  are 
accurately  cemented,  and  no  weed,  be  it  dock  or  pusley, 
dare  show  its  impudent  head  along  his  borders.  His 
trees  grow  according  to  a  pattern.  The  elms  bend  with 
precision,  forming  the  same  regular  curve  on  both  sides, 
and  his  maples  shoot  up  into  thick  pyramids.  If  any  one 
tree  on  his  premises  should  venture  to  lean  or  crook  it 
would  probably  be  removed,  as  nothing  but  mathematical 
symmetry  can  satisfy  the  soul  of  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman. 


HUGH  ARRANGES  A    SERENADE.  117 

It  was  at  one  time  thought  he  might  marry  his  house 
keeper,  who  keeps  his  house  in  the  perfect  order  of  the 
multiplication  table — getting  out  her  "  wash"  by  the  rule 
of  three,  and  serving  up  every  thing  on  the  beautiful  prin 
ciple  of  vulgar  fractions.  But  within  the  last  year  or  two 
he  has  cast  his  eyes  on  the  middle  Bee,  who  is  as  decora 
tive  as  she  is  pretty,  and  the  question  has  been  busily 
canvassed  in  the  village  as  to  whether  Miss  Bee  will  have 
Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman.  There  are  some  who  think  that, 
although  she  has  such  a  gushing  fondness  for  nature,  this 
young  lady  will  take  an  urban  man,  and  never  seriously 
think  of  bestowing  her  charms  and  her  fortune  on  a  vil 
lage  magnate.  There  are  others  who  think  she  might  go 
further  and  fare  worse  ;  as  that  perfect  place  on  Main 
Street  is  a  lure  to  feminine  eyes. 

The  bachelor's  attentions  had  been  going  on  for  some 
time  when  Hugh,  prompted  by  Aunt  Dido,  devised  the 
idea  of  a  serenade  to  the  three  charming  sisters  at  Mill 
Farm.  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman  plays  the  violin  in  a 
sufficiently  feeble  manner  to  accompany  some  of  our  vil 
lage  girls  on  the  piano.  Hugh  invited  him  to  join  the 
serenaders,  and  although  much  older  than  the  young  fel 
lows  who  compose  the  glee  club,  he  consented  to  be  of 
the  party.  Stephen  has  a  fine  command  of  the  flute  and 
is  a  skilled  performer.  When  Hugh  approached  Stephen 
and  opened  the  little  affair  of  the  serenade  with  all  the 
inducements  he  could  throw  around  it  you  should  have 
seen  that  young  man's  face.  At  the  moment  he  hap 
pened  to  be  preparing  for  the  stuffing  process  old  Mrs. 
Holt's  pet  canary,  which  had  died  of  the  pip.  As  he  held 
the  bird  in  his  hand  he  just  turned  short  about  to  shout 
a  terrific  "  no  "  to  Hugh's  request,  and  then  resumed  his 
work,  the  hair  bristling  straight  up  on  the  top  of  his  pug 
nacious  head.  Stephen  has  become  a  dreadful  misogynist 
since  the  loss  of  his  cash.  His  mother  has  now  gone 
away  to  visit  her  sister  for  an  indefinite  length  of  time, 


1*  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

and  Stephen  does  his  own  cooking,  makes  his  bed,  and, 
for  aught  I  know,  washes  his  own  clothes.  He  puts  his 
tin  can  outside  his  door  very  early,  and  locks  it  with  a 
vicious  snap  that  he  may  not  be  forced  to  speak  to  the 
old  milk-woman  when  she  comes  round  of  a  morning. 
Hugh  was  obliged  to  dispense  with  Stephen's  flute  ;  but 
the  Glee  Club  boys  were  all  willing,  and  after  a  great 
many  rehearsals  in  private,  a  beautiful  moonlight  night 
in  spring  was  chosen  for  the  serenade.  The  "  Busy 
Bees  "  were,  of  course,  fully  informed  of  what  was  going 
forward,  and  were  in  a  flutter  of  pleasurable  anticipa 
tion.  The  mill  was  stopped,  the  bulldog  was  chained  up 
in  the  barn  behind  the  house  as  a  necessary  precaution, 
and  the  miller  warned  not  to  get  up  in  the  night  and  point 
his  old  rusty  musket  out  of  the  window  if  he  happened 
to  be  aroused  by  unusual  sounds.  The  young  ladies  had 
prepared  beautiful  bouquets  wherewith  to  pelt  their 
admirers,  and  these  were  all  ranged  along  the  old-fash 
ioned  bureau  under  the  dressing-glass  which  often 
reflected  the  three  charming  faces. 

A  moonlight  night  at  the  mill  is  a  bit  of  paradise 
regained.  The  old  irregular  pile  of  buildings,  with  the 
race  and  the  great  wheel  and  the  many  trees  grouped  at 
the  entrance  of  the  mossy  gleri,  make  a  witching  picture. 
In  furtive  fashion  the  moonbeams  steal  about  the  court, 
glimpsing  upon  the  windows  of  the  chambers  where  the 
"  Busy  Bees  "  repose,  and  quivering  down  in  sparkles 
on  the  many-hued  flower  beds.  It  was  here  in  this  court 
under  the  windows  that  the  Glee  Club  was  ranged,  with 
Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman  a  little  withdrawn,  shrouded  in  his 
inky  cloak,  and  suffering  some  sharp  rheumatic  twinges 
from  the  night  air.  It  was  past  one  in  the  morning,  and 
all  nature  was  deliciously  still  and  dewy,  when  the  spell 
was  broken  by  the  melodious  sound  of  voices  with  a  vio 
lin  accompaniment.  Hugh  let  out  the  full  volume  of  his 
rich  tenor.  The  bachelor  as  first  suitor  bowed  away 


MK.     WISEMAN'S  ACCIDENT.  119 

with  commendable  energy.  They  heard  the  casement 
softly  open.  They  could  catch  faintest  glimpses  of  those 
lovely  Bees  in  light  raiment,  and  the  sound  of  suppressed 
laughter.  The  "  Glees  "  had  sung  in  their  best  style 
"  Come  into  the  Garden,  Maud,"  and  had  given  a  bird 
song  with  prolonged  trills  and  cadences,  when  from 
behind  the  muslin  curtains  came  a  soft  sound  of  hand- 
clapping.  A  shower  of  nosegays  flew  out  of  the  window, 
which  the  happy  serenaders  managed  to  secure  as  they 
pattered  down  in  the  flower-beds.  But  Mr.  Wiseman 
sank  to  the  ground  with  a  suppressed  groan  which 
sounded  like  a  muffled  imprecation.  Something  much 
heavier  than  a  bunch  of  flowers  had  struck  him  on  the 
side  of  the  head  and  demolished  his  violin.  For  a 
moment  he  believed  he  had  been  shot  with  murderous 
intent.  The  windows  of  the  girls'  chamber  were  hastily 
closed.  Hugh  ran  to  the  assistance  of  Mr.  Worldly 
Wiseman,  and  the  other  boys,  with  consternation  painted 
on  their  faces,  gathered  around  and  helped  him  out  into 
the  road,  where  he  continued  to  groan,  while  they  ex 
amined  him  all  over  for  injuries  ;  but  no  wounds  or 
abrasions  could  be  discovered.  Hugh  was  bent  on 
rousing  the  house  to  demand  an  explanation  of  this 
mysterious  assault.  But  the  bachelor  sullenly  restrained 
him,  and  after  giving  himself  a  shake,  said  he  could 
walk  home.  His  personal  pride  and  self-love  had  been 
terribly  wounded,  but  otherwise  he  appeared  to  be  sound. 
His  hat  and  violin,  however,  were  both  badly  damaged. 

In  somber  mood  the  young  men  took  their  way  back 
to  the  village.  There  was  but  little  said,  but  they  all 
kept  up  a  desperate  thinking.  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman  in 
his  battered  state  was  sulky  to  the  point  of  ru-deness  ; 
and  as  soon  as  possible  sought  the  repose  of  his  own 
immaculate  abode,  where  he  nursed  his  wrongs  in  silence. 
\Vhy  the  pretty  Bees  should  have  peppered  their  sere 
naders  with  missiles  harder  than  bouquets  or  billetdoux. 


120  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

remained  a  profound  mystery  for  some  time.  The 
offended  Glee  Club  would  not  go  near  them  to  demand 
an  explanation.  The  old  miller  when  taxed  with  having 
fired  his  gun  out  of  the  window  could  remember  nothing 
of  the  kind.  He  had  slept  soundly  during  the  whole 
fracas,  and  now  took  counsel  with  his  equally  befogged 
wife.  The  girls  were  very  reticent,  at  first,  and  when 
any  thing  was  said  of  this  nocturnal  adventure,  blushed 
and  hung  their  heads,  while  stories  went  through  the 
village  to  the  effect  that  the  "Busy  Bees"  had  of  late 
been  practicing  with  a  pislol  for  their  own  amusement, 
and  had  fired  on  the  whole  pack  of  their  lovers  assembled 
under  their  windows  from  pure  wantonness.  Mr.  Worldly 
Wiseman  had  been  dangerously  wounded,  according  to 
their  account,  and  was  lying  in  a  critical  condition.  But 
Mr.  Wiseman  in  order  to  check  the  tongues  of  the  myth- 
makers  soon  appeared  on  the  street  in  his  usual  health. 

Behold  how  great  a  matter  a  little  fire  kindleth.  After 
a  few  days  it  came  out  just  how  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman 
happened  to  be  assaulted  at  Mill  Farm,  to  the  damage 
of  his  hat  and  violin.  The  youngest  Miss  Bee,  that 
volatile  butterfly  girl,  had  been  suddenly  awakened  from 
a  profound  sleep  by  the  music  of  the  serenaders  under 
her  window.  Her  nosegays  were  all  ready,  tied  with 
celestial  blue  ribbon,  but  in  a  half-waking  somnambulic 
state  she  arose,  fumbled  about  to  find  her  flowers,  and 
seizing  instead,  by  accident,  a  cut-class  scent  bottle, 
hurled  it  from  the  window  with  fatal  aim,  because  she 
took  no  aim  at  all.  She  and  her  sisters  have  tried  to 
appease  the  wrath  of  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman  by  many 
unobtrusive  attentions,  but  the  village  Achilles  still 
nurses  his  offended  dignity  in  his  tent.  Thus  many  a 
budding  and  incipient  romance  is  spoiled  by  a  ridiculous 
little  accident  for  which  no  one  is  really  to  blame. 

Hugh  has  made  it  up  with  the  Bees,  and  goes  on  flirt 
ing  with  all  of  them  just  as  usual, 


CHAPTER  XIV. 
THE  DOCTOR'S  TROUBLE. 

THE  ties  which  bind  a  small  community  together  are 
many  and  subtile.  You  may  dislike  your  neighbor 
in  the  village  ;  you  may  envy  or  distrust  him,  or  feel  con 
tempt  for  his  ability  or  his  pretensions,  but  when  he  is  ill 
or  in  trouble,  or  when  death  comes  knocking  at  his  door, 
you  can  not  ignore  him.  Human  fellowship  is  still  found 
to  be  strong  and  active.  The  trained  nurse  has  not  yet 
come  in  to  prevent  neighborly  offices  performed  by  the 
gentle  hands  of  good  women.  Housewives  still  cook 
little  delicacies  to  tempt  the  appetite  of  the  invalid  across 
the  way  or  in  the  next  street.  Bonny  girls  and  children 
carry  flowers  to  sick  chambers.  When  death  comes,  the 
undertaker  does  not  do  all  that  is  required.  Experienced 
women  enter  the  house  of  mourning  with  a  kind  of  au 
thority  and  perform  the  last  kind  offices  for  the  dead. 

Many  a  poor  creature  has  passed  away  with  a  certain 
sense  of  comfort  in  her  heart  from  the  thought  of  kind 
neighbors  who  would  not  let  the  family  suffer,  who  would 
see  all  things  done  decently  and  in  order  at  the  funeral. 
These  customs  are  good  and  humanizing.  In  prosperity 
the  people  may  bicker  and  backbite,  they  may  nurse  their 
jealousies  and  piques  and  divisions,  but  when  trouble 
comes  they  are  united.  They  see  the  solemn  fate  bring 
ing  all  to  equality  of  lot,  and  they  stand  together  in  a 
closer  sense  of  brotherhood. 

The  doctor,  as  we  know,  has  had  poignant  experience 
of  other  people's  sorrows.  He  has  experienced  living 
and  dying  troubles  by  the  score,  and  taken  a  multitude 
of  human  griefs  into  his  own  breast.  He  has  felt  for  his 


122  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

fellow  man  and  woman  in  a  humble  sphere  with  the  ten 
derness,  charity,  and  compassion  which  might  have  made 
a  saint,  and  yet  how  far  is  he  from  being  a  saint.  Into 
his  ear  have  been  poured  the  troubles  of  lowly  lives,  the 
discouragements  of  poor  farmers  and  mechanics,  the 
griefs  of  over-worked,  dispirited  women,  the  heartaches 
of  maidens  and  young  men  whose  aspirations  have  been 
crushed  out,  the  struggles  of  lonely  and  saintly  souls  of 
whom  some  still  remain  in  the  foldings  of  our  blue  hills. 

The  doctor  has  never  betrayed  a  secret  in  his  life.  He 
does  not  talk  about  his  bad  cases  at  home,  thus  to  find 
relief  from  mental  strain.  When  he  has  a  very  sick 
patient  on  his  hands,  he  betrays  his  anxiety  by  swallowing 
a  great  many  cups  of  strong  tea,  which  his  wife  knows  to 
be  bad  for  him.  If  things  are  getting  desperate,  he  some 
times  braces  up  on  a  small  glass  of  brandy,  which  he  takes 
from  a  side  cupboard  in  his  office  stocked  with  some 
choice  old  liquors  kept  for  medicinal  purposes.  The 
doctor  is  so  strictly  temperate  in  all  his  habits  that  when 
his  grandchild  sees  him  take  a  drink  of  clear  spirits  from 
the  decanter,  she  always  knows  there  is  something  disas 
trous  in  the  wind  and  watches  him  with  wistful  eyes, 
though  even  she  has  learned  it  is  never  safe  to  question 
him  about  his  cases. 

The  doctor  has  a  hot,  passionate  temper.  His  growl 
is  something  terrific,  and  not  to  be  encountered  with 
temerity.  Miss  Candace  laughs,  and  says  she  rather 
likes  it,  it  is  such  an  honest  and  sincere  sound.  There 
is  no  cant  in  the  doctor's  growl,  nor  is  there  any  conces 
sion  to  false  conventionalities.  He  has  a  lightning-like 
directness  of  speech  and  action,  and  it  is  never  safe  to 
beard  him  in  the  wrong  mood.  But  like  such  violently 
contrasted  natures,  when  he  is  genial  nothing  can  exceed 
the  warmth  and  brightness  that  rays  out  of  his  being. 
Like  a  central  sun  he  seems  to  light  the  world,  and  the 
amount  of  beautiful  poetry  he  recites  gives  evidence  of 


EF TIE'S  LITTLE  INHERITANCE.  123 

his  prodigious  memory.  To  his  poor  patients  who  can  pay 
nothing  but  thanks,  and  to  whom  he  often  gives  the 
medicine  he  prescribes,  the  doctor  frequently  shows  this 
beautiful  side  of  his  character.  He  is  worshiped  by 
crippled  children  and  wretched  women,  as  if  he  had  been 
canonized  and  held  a  place  in  the  calendar. 

When  any  thing  happens  to  the  doctor,  a  tocsin 
rings  through  the  village,  and  people  are  aroused.  Even 
the  people  who  have  fought  with  him,  and  have  de 
nounced  his  violence,  stand  aghast  at  the  thought  of  any 
calamity  overtaking  the  principal  institution  of  the  town. 
The  thunderbolt  has  struck  his  roof  more  than  once,  as 
you  can  read  in  the  pale,  saintly  face  of  his  wife,  whom 
the  neighbors  are  apt  to  think  is  altogether  too  submis 
sive  to  her  lord  and  master. 

It  is  known  to  but  few  that  the  doctor's  grandchild 
will  inherit  a  small  fortune  from  a  distant  relative  when 
she  comes  of  age.  This  legacy  was  much  exaggerated 
by  public  rumor  and  before  the  end  of  two  years  the 
larger  part  of  it  was  lost  by  bad  investments.  The  girl 
herself  was  unaware  of  the  fact,  as  the  doctor  and  his  wife 
have  carefully  sought  to  conceal  it  from  Effie  until  she  is 
older  and  has  received  a  thorough  education.  But  the 
villagers  do  well  remember  all  the  painful,  harrowing 
circumstances  of  Effie's  birth  and  early  childhood  ;  how 
the  father  absconded  to  Europe  with  a  degraded  woman, 
and  the  broken-hearted  mother  and  little  child  were 
taken  into  the  doctor's  household.  Effie's  mother  faded 
away  in  two  years,  and  the  child,  though  still  very 
young,  was  deeply  impressed  by  the  wrongs  and  suffer 
ings  she  had  endured  from  a  dissolute  father.  It  was 
this  trouble  which  aged  the  doctor  and  whitened  the 
brown  locks  of  his  wife.  But  years  passed  on.  The 
child  was  growing  up  to  take  the  place  of  the  daughter 
they  had  lost.  The  doctor  recovered  his  firmness  and 
poise.  His  eyes  grew  keen  and  bright  again.  In  a  year 


124  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

or  two  now  Effie  could  go  before  the  court  and  choose 
her  own  guardian,  and  all  danger  from  the  renegade 
father's  claim  would  be  at  an  end.  Secret  terrors  lest 
Philip  should  come  back  to  try  and  get  possession  of  the 
girl,  now  that  she  had  inherited  property,  were  always 
afflicting  the  soul  of  the  doctor's  wife.  At  times  she 
would  not  let  Effie  go  out  alone  through  the  village 
streets.  The  doctor  knew  just  what  it  meant  when  he 
saw  one  of  these  nervous  tremors  taking  possession  of 
his  wife  ;  I  believe  she  dreaded  the  blandishments  of 
the  handsome  unprincipled  Philip  and  the  power  he 
might  gain  over  the  mind  of  the  child  more  than  any 
thing  else. 

But  as  they  saw  Effie  growing  taller  and  more  womanly 
each  day,  their  fears  were  quieted,  and  their  vigilance 
fell  asleep.  One  afternoon  in  April  or  early  May,  I  know 
the  tulip  beds  were  all  ablaze  in  the  Squire's  garden, 
Effie  rushed  quite  pale  and  disheveled  into  her  grand 
father's  office,  and  threw  herself  sobbing  into  his  arms. 
In  broken  words,  when  she  could  command  her  voice, 
she  told  him  of  a  dreadful  fright  she  had  received  com 
ing  home  from  school.  Two  men  on  the  old  turnpike 
had  tried  to  force  her  into  a  carriage.  But  she  screamed 
loudly,  and  resisted  with  all  her  might,  and  was  heard 
by  an  old  man,  Eben  Tripp,  who  was  driving  along  in 
his  "  democrat  "  wagon.  The  men  seeing  him  so  near 
let  her  go,  and  whipped  up  their  horses.  Her  books 
had  fallen  into  the  dirt  in  the  road,  and  she  was  tremb 
ling  so  she  could  hardly  stand,  but  old  man  Tripp  gath 
ered  up  the  books,  and  put  her  into  the  wagon,  and 
brought  her  home.  And  then  Effie  asked  under  her 
breath,  her  large  eyes  strained  wide  with  fright  :  "  Was 
it  that  man  that  used  my  mother  so  ?  Oh,  grandpa,  don't 
let  him  get  me."  The  doctor  grew  rigid  as  stone.  He 
clinched  his  hands  until  the  nails  were  driven  into  the 
flesh,  but  he  tried  to  soothe  the  child,  and  finally  he  put 


THE    WIFE'S  SUSPICIONS.  12$ 

her  to  bed  and  gave  her  a  sleeping  potion,  and  then  he 
told  his  wife  the  evil  days  had  come  upon  them.  Thje 
next  day  very  early  Effie  was  sent  away  to  a  safe  place. 

In  a  day  or  two  it  began  to  be  whispered  about  the 
place  that  strangers  were  abiding  at  Saw  Mill  Hollow,  a 
little  hamlet  two  miles  away.  Who  they  probably  were 
and  the  purport  of  their  visit  filled  the  air  with  conjec 
tures  and  vague  disquiet.  The  old  doctor's  face  was  a 
study  at  this  time,  and  many  watched  it,  though  none 
dared  to  question  him.  He  went  doggedly  about  his 
business,  but  all  his  leisure  he  was  locked  up  in  his  office 
busy  with  secret  matters,  while  his  wife  sat  anxious  and 
alone  in  her  own  room,  or  moved  about  the  house  with  her 
soft,  still  tread.  One  day,  the  week  after  Effie  was  sent 
off,  she  slipped  into  the  office  ;  the  doctor,  as  she  sup 
posed,  had  gone  into  the  country  to  visit  a  very  sick 
man.  After  searching  a  long  time  in  various  corners  she 
came  upon  a  pair  of  old  pistols  newly  polished  and  care 
fully  oiled.  But  the  doctor  had  not  gone  to  the  coun 
try,  it  seemed,  for  he  surprised  his  wife  with  one  of  the 
weapons  in  her  hand.  As  he  stopped  at  the  door  and 
looked  in  :  "  Judith,"  he  cried,  sternly  ;  "  what  are  you 
about  ? " 

"  John,  John  Rivington,  you  are  going  to  murder 
him."  It  was  all  the  answer  she  could  make,  for  her 
heart  was  constricted  and  her  tongue  parched. 

"  I  am  going  to  have  it  out  with  him,  that's  a  fact. 
And  mind  what  I  say,  Judith  ;  you  must  keep  still  and 
not  try  to  interfere." 

She  was  still  as  a  statue  of  despair,  and  as  she  slipped 
down  in  his  old  office  chair  he  thought  she  would  faint. 
Seeing  that  great  anguish  in  her  tearless  face,  the 
doctor  by  a  sudden  impulse  took  the  pistols  out  of  the 
drawer  and  laid  them  in  her  lap. 

"  Here,  you  may  take  these  things  away.  I  won't  do 
it  with  firearms,  I'll  use  my  fists.  But  I  must  have  it  out 


126  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

with  that  man,  for  life  is  not  worth  a  brass  farthing  to 
me  while  he  skulks  around  here  with  his  cursed  detec 
tive,  and  goes  unpunished." 

That  was  all  that  passed  between  them,  and  a  few  days 
later  the  doctor  met  Philip  on  the  road  to  Saw  Mill  Hol 
low.  It  was  just  at  dusk,  when  soft  brown  velvet  shadows 
filled  the  spring  twilight.  He  had  not  seen  his  son-in-law 
for  twelve  years,  but  he  knew  him  at  a  glance  of  his  old 
eagle  eye,  and  instantly  he  leaped  from  his  wagon  and 
grappled  with  his  enemy.  The  doctor  being  a  more 
powerful  man  than  Philip,  with  the  heavy  horsewhip  he 
carried  gave  him  a  terrible  punishing.  There  in  the 
brown  shadows,  where  the  birds  were  softly  calling  to 
their  mates,  the  two  men  clinched  and  fought,  rolled  over 
on  the  grass,  or  rising  to  their  feet  took  a  new  life-and- 
death  grip.  The  struggle  went  on  until  some  laborers  in 
the  fields,  hearing  groans  and  stifled  cries,  ran  to  the  place 
and  found  Philip  lying  deathly  white  by  the  roadside, 
with  the  old  man,  his  clothes  torn  and  muddy,  standing 
over  him  like  a  lion  at  bay. 

No  one  molested  the  doctor.  He  got  into  his  wagon 
and  drove  home.  In  spite  of  the  terrible  condition  of  his 
clothes,  he  looked  excited  and  almost  young  as  he  burst 
into  his  wife's  sitting-room.  The  lamp  had  just  been 
brought  in.  She  sat  there  still  and  apprehensive,  listen 
ing  to  every  sound.  "  Well,  Judith,  you  see  I've  done  it," 
looking  down  at  his  coat. 

"You  haven't  killed  him,  John?"  "Pretty  nigh,"  he 
said  curtly.  "  Not  many  whole  bones  left  in  his  body,  I 
guess.  It  was  a  long  score,  Judith,  and  it  had  to  be 
cleared  off.  You  must  make  haste  and  put  up  a  few 
things  in  a  bag,  for  as  soon  as  I  have  cleaned  myself  and 

changed  my  clothes  I  am  going  to  drive  over  to 

(naming  the  county  town)  to  give  myself  up  to  Sheriff 
Dawson."  She  stood  up  to  obey  him  silently,  but  her 
limbs  refused  their  office,  and  the  doctor  put  his  arm 


THE  DOCTOR   GIVES  HIMSELF   UP.  127 

around  her  and  drew  her  close  to  him.  It  was  not  an 
habitual  thing  with  these  two.  Perhaps  he  kissed  her. 
"  Judith,"  he  said,  "  I  haven't  been  a  very  good  husband 
to  you.  I  have  been  too  obstinate  and  self-willed  to  make 
you  very  happy  ;  but  if  any  thing  should  happen  to  sepa 
rate  us,  I  want  you  to  believe  this  thing  had  to  be  done." 

That  night  the  doctor  gave  himself  up  to  Sheriff  Daw- 
g0n — routing  that  functionary  out  of  bed  in  the  small 
hours  to  tell  his  story  and  to  put  himself  in  the  power  of 
the  law.  The  sheriff  was  an  old  and  tried  friend,  and 
much  troubled  by  the  necessity.  He  gave  the  doctor  a 
room  in  his  own  house,  and  turned  the  key  upon  him.  It 
would  be  impossible  to  describe  the  excitement  that  sim 
mered,  and  bubbled,  and  boiled  in  the  village  when  the 
fact  was  made  known  that  the  doctor  had  thrashed 
Philip  Hadley  within  an  inch  of  his  life  on  Saw  Mill  Hol 
low  road.  The  little  town  seemed  hung  in  black,  for 
now  he  was  in  trouble  the  people  were  to  a  man,  woman, 
and  child  loyal  to  the  old  man.  He  had  great  faults, 
of  course,  but  who  was  there  like  him  for  grand  virtues? 

In  the  morning  reports  came  that  Philip  was  dying. 
He  had  been  carried  to  his  lodging  in  Saw  Mill  Hollow, 
and  the  local  doctor  had  been  called  in.  Some  of  his  ribs 
were  broken,  but  the  worst  feature  of  his  case  was  con 
cussion  of  the  brain.  His  antagonist  had  given  him  a 
heavy  fall  on  stony  ground.  The  people  were  feverishly 
anxious  that  Philip  should  live.  A  messenger  came 
every  hour  from  Saw  Mill  Hollow  to  report.  It  would 
be  impossible  to  get  a  jury  together  in  the  county  to  con 
vict  the  doctor  of  murder,  for  the  story  of  Philip  Had- 
ley's  rascality  was  too  well  known,  but  the  anxiety  lest 
Philip  should  die  was  none  the  less  agonizing.  In  a  day 
or  two,  when  a  slightly  favorable  turn  had  taken  place  in 
Philip's  state,  it  was  known  that  the  doctor  would  be 
released  on  bail,  and  half  the  men  in  the  village  crowded 
the  first  train  down  to  the  county  town  to  offer  to  go  on 


128  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

his  bond.  There  was  the  judge,  and  the  minister,  and 
the  old  shoemaker,  and  Hugh,  and  Peckham,  and  Mr. 
Worldly  Wiseman,  and  the  postmaster,  and  even  Jake 
Small  and  Tim  McCoy,  whom  the  doctor  had  brought 
through  that  bad  illness. 

When  the  village  delegation  squeezed  into  the  sheriff's 
office  it  was  a  remarkable  sight.  The  doctor  had  been 
very  cheerful,  indeed,  in  the  best  of  spirits  since  he  gave 
himself  up,  but  this  demonstration  almost  unmanned  him, 
and  he  could  only  grasp  the  hands  of  his  old  neighbors, 
for  his  voice  was  entirely  too  husky  to  attempt  a  word. 
All  the  property  in  the  village  might  have  been  pledged 
for  his  prompt  appearance  at  this  trial,  but  the  signature 
of  Judge  Magnus  was  all-sufficient. 

When  he  found  himself  a  free  man  once  more  the  first 
thing  the  doctor  did  was  to  inquire  particularly  after 
the  condition  of  Philip  and  the  mode  of  his  treatment. 
When  told  the  latest  news,  that  Philip  was  wandering  in 
his  mind  and  in  a  high  fever,  the  old  man  muttered  to 
himself:  "  It's  that  ass  of  a  Dodds."  Well,  1  know  not 
how  it  happened:  when  the  neighbors  reached  the  village 
escorting  the  old  man,  they  found  the  flags  flying  from 
all  the  houses  that  possessed  flags  and  the  big  banner 
from  the  liberty-pole.  By  a  spontaneous  movement  of 
sympathy  every  body  crowded  into  the  street  to  welcome 
him,  and  some  of  the  lads  got  into  the  belfry  of  the  church 
and  rang  the  bell  as  they  always  do  on  Fourth  of  July 
morning,  and  somebody  fired  the  old  cannon  on  the  com 
mon.  Philip  Hadley  was  still  in  danger  of  death,  but  he 
was  two  miles  away,  and  the  people  did  not  care  to 
think  of  him,  or  if  they  did  think  of  him,  it  was  with  the 
feeling  that  he  richly  deserved  his  punishment.  He  had 
ruined  the  life  and  broken  the  heart  of  the  doctor's  only 
daughter,  and  he  had  tried  to  steal  his  grand  child  to 
get  possession  of  her  little  fortune. 

The  doctor  was  serene  as  a  May  morning.     He  had 


HOW  PHILIP'S   WQCNflS    WERE   HEALED.       129 

performed  an  ugly  task,  but  it  had  been  laid  upon  him, 
and  he  had  not  flinched.  Now  that  he  was  at  home 
again,  however,  his  professional  conscience  began  to 
work.  He  felt  almost  sure  that  Dodds  by  his  blunder 
ing  would  let  the  fellow  die  ;  and  now  that  justice  had 
been  meted  out  to  him  he  did  not  wish  him  to  die  ;  in 
deed,  he  desired  to  save  him.  So  one  dark  night,  he  stole 
down  the  Saw  Mill  Hollow  road,  and  paid  a  clandestine 
visit  to  his  precious  son-in-law,  whose  bones  he  had  so 
recently  broken.  Philip  was  still  wandering  in  delirium 
and  did  not  know  him.  The  doctor  of  course  decided 
that  the  treatment  was  all  wrong,  and  in  a  day  or  two  he 
arranged  with  Dodds,  and  openly  took  charge  of  the 
case  ;  and  so  rapidly  did  he  heal  the  wounds  he  had  made 
that  in  two  weeks  Philip  Hadley  was  on  the  road  to 
health. 

This  thing  was  so  characteristic  of  the  doctor  that  it 
caused  a  great  deal  of  laughter  in  the  village.  But  there 
were  other  important  consequences  which  grew  out  of 
this  anomalous  position  of  affairs.  Philip  Hadley,  dur 
ing  his  convalescence,  professed  great  penitence,  and 
made  the  doctor  believe  he  was  a  changed  man — that 
the  drubbing  he  had  received  had  been  to  him  a  means 
of  spiritual  grace  and  renewal.  And  when  the  doctor 
saw  him  off  on  the  railway  train  he  actually  gave  him  a 
considerable  sum  of  money  to  set  himself  up  in  morality 
and  good  behavior.  The  case  against  the  doctor  is 
what  Jake  Small  calls  "  squashed."  No  one  thinks  less 
of  him  for  what  he  did,  and  I  am  afraid  he  has  risen  in 
the  estimation  of  many.  "  Taint  Christian  doctrine,  is 
it  ?  "  asked  Mother  Embery  of  the  parson.  "  Scriptur' 
says,  if  you  are  smote  on  the  right  cheek  you  must  turn 
the  left."  "  Perhaps  he  isn't  a  Christian,"  returned  the 
young  clergyman  thoughtfully,  "  but  we  must  all  admit 
that  he  is  a  fine  old  pagan." 


CHAPTER    XV. 

THE  BOY  ALMIRA  ADOPTED. 

THESE  spring  evenings,  when  the  light  begins  to  linger 
on  the  growing  grass  pied  with  dandelions,  and  the 
buds  to  pout  on  the  lilac  bushes,  the  children  play  in  the 
streets  with  unwonted  vigor,  and  their  sports  take  on  an 
epic  "beauty  and  grace  I  never  remark  at  any  other  time 
of  year.  Their  choric  dances  are  like  pictures  on  old 
classic  vases,  and  unconsciously  they  assume  the  most 
beautiful  and  unstudied  attitudes,  especially  the  little 
girls,  when  they  throw  off  their  hats  and  let  the  tresses 
float  free  on  the  wind.  From  all  lanes  and  by-places 
come  those  sounds  of  children  shouting,  as  much  a  part 
of  the  opening  season  as  the  cheep  of  nestlings  or  the 
great  bum-boom  of  the  bullfrog's  bass-viol  in  the  pond. 

Now  come  into  the  fields,  where  the  farmer's  boy  in 
the  early  plowing  turns  the  rich  brown  furrow  with  a 
pair  of  red  oxen.  The  sky  is  so  soft  and  vaporous  with 
broken  lights  and  large  luminous  clouds,  the  humble 
scene  appears  to  breathe  the  poetry  of  one  of  Millet's 
pictures.  A  black  skurry  of  clouds  comes  over  to  drop 
a  sudden  sharp  shower  into  the  newly  turned  clod.  Then 
it  moves  frowningly  off,  and  the  sky  comes  out  in  such 
dazzling  bursts  of  splendor — the  king-birds  and  thrushes 
shake  the  drops  from  their  wings  and  trill  forth  in  sud 
den  ecstasy,  until  you  deplore  your  own  dumbness,  and 
long  to  join  in  that  chorus  of  nature  :  "  Praise  the 
Lord,  O  my  soul,  and  all  that  is  within  me  praise  His 
holy  name."  A  flash  darts  across  the  sky,  and  thunder 
cracks  over  the  woods,  and  goes  rumbling  along  Saddle- 


ANCESTRAL  FARMS.  131 

back  in  a  grand  surly  growl.  It  seems  to  shake  the  forest 
trees  to  their  deepest  roots,  and  to  open  the  lids  of  the 
flowers  with  a  start  of  surprise.  The  furrow  is  good  and 
fructuous,  and  sheds  abroad  that  terrene  smell  we  notice 
on  warm  spring  days,  when  the  earth  seems  to  purr  with 
content. 

In  many  parts  of  the  country  the  farms  are  practically 
abandoned  or  leased  to  the  Irish  or  to  French  Cana 
dians.  But  it  is  not  so  here,  where  the  land  has  come 
down  through  generations  in  unbroken  lines  of  inheri 
tance.  The  farmers  are  not  all  hurrying  and  eager  to 
get  rich.  Some  of  them  are  content  just  to  live  along  in 
comfort,  making  both  ends  meet  as  their  fathers  did. 
There  is  generally  one  son  who  is  willing  to  stay  on  the 
old  place,  and  sometimes  it  falls  to  a  daughter's  share  to 
take  the  laboring  oar  and  keep  the  ancestral  farm  in  the 
family.  There  is  a  pretty  walk  to  just  such  a  farm 
through  a  piece  of  woods  that  lies  not  far  from  the  town. 
These  woods  begin  to  look  social  again  on  a  pleasant 
spring  day.  Their  elegant  openness  gives  one  a  new 
sense  of  light  and  space.  They  remind  one  of  royal 
saloons  in  the  grand  old  Italian  palaces  frescoed  with 
the  sky  and  heavenly  bodies.  No  columns  of  porphyry 
or  marble  can  exceed  the  beauty  of  the  tree  trunks  spotted 
with  moss  and  lichen  and  so  richly  colored  and  carved. 
It  is  good  to  get  among  them  after  a  winter  spent  in  the 
village  streets.  You  feel  as  if  you  were  moving  into 
nature.  The  hepatica  and  wind-flower,  and  the  trailing 
arbutus,  betray  themselves  in  spite  of  the  brown  leaves 
where  they  are  hidden.  Scrape  away  the  rubbish  and 
you  will  see  where  they  are  pushing  upbuds  in  knots  and 
clusters.  The  waxy  leaf  buds  that  tip  the  twigs  of  forest 
trees  are  as  yet  very  backward-looking.  Cold  spring 
storms  come  to  repress  all  the  aspirations  of  the  growing 
world.  But  a  delicate  beauty  clings  to  the  first  move 
ments  of  spring,  and  lights  familiar  fields  and  hillsides 


I32  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

with  a  gleam  out  of  some  new  source  of  beneficence. 
The  soft  brown  landscape  mellows  into  smiles  of  greet 
ing  where  it  touches  the  blue  of  the  sky.  There  is  a 
clean,  wholesome  look  about  the  world.  Its  face  has  been 
thoroughly  washed,  and  all  things  are  ready  for  a  new 
revelation  of  beauty. 

The  old  farm-house  I  mentioned  stands  near  this  wood 
land,  where  the  villagers  come  in  spring  to  search  for 
arbutus.  It  stands  close  to  the  road,  with  a  horse-trough 
a  little  way  beyond  under  a  wide-spreading  balm  of 
Gilead.  The  house  is  nearly  a  hundred  years  old.  A 
long  shed  is  attached  to  its  southern  side,  and  the  gable 
is  ornamented  with  an  angel  trumpeter  surmounted  by  a 
vane,  which  has  steadily  pointed  north-east  for  the  last 
ten  years.  The  ancient  rooms  are  furnished  much  as 
they  were  at  the  beginning  of  this  century.  The  old 
chairs,  and  tables,  and  presses,  and  chests  of  drawers  are 
still  intact.  Braided  mats  and  strips  of  rag  carpet  cover 
the  floor.  The  high  clock  ticks  in  the  corner  of  the 
sitting-room.  The  loom  holds  its  place  in  the  garret. 
A  spinning-wheel  and  two  little  flax  wheels  are  nicely 
kept  in  a  chamber  up  stairs.  All  the  bedrooms  are 
furnished  with  high-post  testered  beds  and  dimity  cur 
tains  trimmed  with  knotted  fringe.  The  old  brasses  of 
the  fireplace,  the  warming-pan,  and  the  quaint  bellows 
are  all  in  place.  The  outer  door  still  has  those  quaint 
holes  furnished  with  flaps — a  large  one  for  the  cat  and  a 
small  one  for  the  kitten.  The  ancient  book-shelf  is 
furnished  with  its  pictorial  Bible,  its  New  England  primer, 
Cotton  Mather's  "  Magnalia,"  Michael  Wigglesworth's 
"  Day  of  Doom,"  the  works  of  Jonathan  Edwards^ 
Baxter's  "  Saints'  Rest,"  and  the  "  Holy  Living  and 
Dying."  The  keeping-room  has  a  few  modern  additions 
in  the  way  of  rugs  and  curtains  to  make  it  comfortable, 
but  it  is  mainly  unaltered.  The  front  door,  with  its  worn 
granite  step,  opens  directly  on  a  smooth  unfenced  bit  of 


ALMIRA.  133 

Almira  turf,  with  a  little  footpath  trickling  down  to  the 
wagon-track.  A  pleasing  prospect  lies  before  it  of  the 
lazy  little  river,  the  intervale,  and  distant  hiils. 

This  old  house  has  come  by  direct  inheritance  into  the 
possession  of  a  fashionable  city  woman,  who  was  married 
in  the  keeping-room  on  the  very  spot  where  her  mother 
stood  up  to  be  married  some  twenty-five  or  thirty  years 
earlier.  It  is  the  story  of  the  mother  chiefly  which  is 
interesting,  for  though  the  daughter  is  brilliant  and 
attractive,  she  is  not,  so  the  old  people  in  the  village  say, 
endowed  with  more  than  a  tithe  of  her  mother's  talent. 

Almira,  as  I  will  call  her,  was  one  of  those  maiden 
farmers  who  hereabouts  occasionally  take  charge  of  the 
old  place  when  there  are  no  men  folk  left,  or  when,  if 
there  are,  they  prefer  some  other  occupation.  She  had 
been  brought  up  on  the  farm,  and  a  few  years  away  at 
school  was  all  the  change  she  had  ever  known.  Almira 
was  intensely,  absorbingly  pious,  and  at  an  early  age,  as 
she  recorded  in  her  journal,  she  determined  that  she 
would  never  marry,  but  would  devote  herself  to  the  ser 
vice  of  God  and  the  education  of  the  young.  She  let 
most  of  the  land  on  shares,  and  then  she  took  in  a  pair 
of  decrepit  relatives  and  kept  them  in  comfort  till  they 
died.  But  this  and  the  general  management  of  the  house 
hold  did  not  interfere  at  all  with  the  great  object  of  her 
life,  what  she  had  called  in  her  journal  the  education  of 
the  young.  Teaching  was  Almira's  absorbing  love.  It 
is  acknowledged  that  she  laid  the  foundation  of  the 
excellent  school  system  of  the  town,  and  her  name  is 
still  mentioned  as  that  of  the  most  remarkable  woman 
this  part  of  the  country  has  produced.  But  her  fame  is 
purely  local.  It  does  not  extend  beyond  the  shadow  of 
Saddleback. 

Almira's  studies  went  on  with  all  her  varied  interests 
and  occupations.  She  took  a  deep  interest  in  the 
religious  controversies  of  the  day,  and  was  listened  to 


134  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

with  much  deference  and  respect  by  clergymen,  many  of 
whom  were  her  friends.  One  winter,  it  is  said,  while 
studying  Bible  exegesis,  she  knit  a  large  number  of 
woolen  stockings  for  the  poor  of  the  town,  as  she  could 
contrive  to  turn  the  heels  and  toes  by  instinct  without 
giving  much  heed  to  work.  The  little  stone  school- 
house,  resembling  a  juvenile  penitentiary,  where  she 
began  her  teaching,  was  preserved  for  many  years  as  a 
kind  of  relic  of  Almira.  She  opened  and  closed  her 
school  invariably  with  fervent  prayer,  and  labored  in 
season  and  out  of  season  for  the  conversion  of  her  pupils. 
She  taught  for  some  time  in  this  jail-like  building,  until 
the  fame  of  her  great  ability  and  acquirements  caused 
her  to  be  elected  preceptress  of  the  village  academy. 
She  fitted  many  youths  for  college,  and  her  mathematical 
and  Latin  instruction,  in  those  days,  was  considered 
second  to  none.  Almira's  pale,  serious  face  was  bordered 
by  brown  hair,  brushed  behind  the  ears  with  Puritan 
simplicity.  Her  dress  was  always  severely  plain  in  cut 
and  make,  her  forehead  high,  expanded,  and  broad,  was 
the  home  of  a  royal  intellect.  The  girl  had  never  been 
young.  From  her  tenderest  years  she  had  been  weighted 
with  a  sense  of  the  awfulness  of  sin  and  the  burdens  of 
the  moral  law.  In  her  eightieth  year,  for  she  lived  to  be 
a  very  old  woman,  she  was  really  young,  gentle,  sportive, 
and  possessed  of  a  pleasant  humor. 

It  was  while  Almira  was  still  teaching  in  the  stone 
school-house,  that  she  chanced  one  day  to  meet  a  little 
lad  of  ten  who  was  looking  for  some  lost  cows  on  the 
hill-side.  He  was  a  bright-faced,  handsome  boy,  as  she 
discovered  in  spite  of  his  bare  feet,  patched  trowsers, 
and  torn  straw  hat.  In  his  perplexity  he  had  caught  a 
"daddy  long-legs,"  and  with  a  country  boy's  formula 
was  invoking  its  aid  to  discover  the  strayed  cattle.  He 
held  the  insect  in  his  hand  and  said  aloud,  "  Daddy, 
daddy,  which  way  have  the  cows  gone  ?"  Thereupon 


THE    CHARITY  BOY.  135 

daddy  pointed  with  his  feelers  in  the  right  direction,  or 
was  expected  so  to  do. 

Almira  was  pleased  with  the  lad.  When  she  ques 
tioned  him  he  looked  straight  in  her  eyes,  and  answered 
with  promptness.  She  found  he  was  a  charity  boy 
"  bound  "  to  a  neighboring  farmer  for  five  years.  He  had 
never  received  any  schooling,  indeed,  was  as  ignorant  as 
a  little  savage,  both  of  science  and  the  Westminster  Cat 
echism.  This  was  a  state  of  things  Almira  could  not 
abide.  She  tried  to  induce  his  master  to  send  him  to 
school,  but  failing  in  this,  she  finally  offered  him  a  sum 
of  money  to  break  the  indenture,  that  the  boy  Eben 
might  be  given  up  to  her.  In  time  she  carried  her  point, 
and  Eben  was  transferred  to  the  old  farm-house,  where 
he  became  Almira's  pupil  and  helper,  indeed,  her  adopted 
child.  She  took  hold  of  him  with  the  joy  such  a  woman 
feels  in  having  a  human  being  all  her  own  to  try  her  the 
ories  upon.  At  night,  after  school  hours,  he  did  "  chores," 
drove  the  old  horse,  split  the  fire-wood,  or  with  a  femi 
nine  apron  tied  about  his  neck  churned  the  butter.  She 
brought  him  up  in  the  strictest  creed,  instilling  into  him 
all  the  rigors  of  the  Old  Testament  law,  while  she  taught 
him  all  the  profane  learning  she  herself  had  mastered. 
She  did  her  utmost  to  educate  the  boy  as  a  model  of 
learning  and  Christian  character,  and  to  consecrate  him 
a  chosen  vessel  to  the  service  of  the  Lord.  And  if  Eben 
did  not  take  as  kindly  to  theology  as  she  wished,  it  was 
soon  evident  that  he  was  the  brightest  boy  in  Almira's 
school.  She  fitted  him  for  college  at  sixteen,  and  en 
tered  him  at  old  Harvard.  At  a  time  when  the  college 
course  was  not  as  expensive  as  it  is  now  it  was  no  light 
task  to  pay  all  her  boy's  bills  with  the  result  of  her  school- 
keeping.  Her  colony  of  old  people  and  poor  relations 
at  the  farm  had  grown  somewhat  of  late  years,  and  the 
farm  itself  hardly  paid  expenses,  having  no  energetic 
man  at  the  fore. 


I36  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS, 

But  Almira  worked  on  incessantly,  taking  no  rest, 
glad  to  sacrifice  health  and  strength  for  the  boy  Eben, 
and  rejoicing  in  his  brilliant  progress.  All  his  bills  were 
promptly  paid  when  he  was  graduated  with  flying  colors 
at  the  end  of  four  years  ;  but  Almira  was  older  and  more 
careworn  than  she  ought  to  have  been  for  a  woman  but 
a  few  years  past  the  first  corner  of  old  maidenhood. 
Indeed,  she  looked  upon  herself  then  as  an  old  woman. 
Eben  had  developed  into  a  stalwart,  handsome  man,  of 
great  stature.  He  spent  his  vacations  at  home,  and 
could  mow  in  the  hay-field,  or  break  a  wild  colt,  equal  to 
any  young  farmer  in  the  country.  There  was  a  profes 
sion  to  be  thought  of,  and  in  spite  of  all  Almira  could 
say  he  decided  against  the  ministry  and  chose  the  law. 
He  worked  his  way  through  the  law  school  by  tutoring 
and  the  usual  grind  of  student  life. 

It  was  during  this  period  that  Almira  thought  con 
stantly  of  Eben's  future  and  prayed  over  it  not  a  little. 
With  his  brilliant  parts  and  great  promise,  she  saw  the 
prizes  of  life  ready  to  drop  into  his  hand.  He  would 
live  in  a  large  town,  mix  with  men  of  talent,  and  marry 
some  charming  gii'f  and  rear  a  family  of  children  ;  and 
she  would  necessarily  grow  to  be  less  and  less  to  him, 
and  at  last  drop  out  of  his  life.  So  she  prayed  for  pure 
self-abnegation.  Some  of  the  most  interesting  human 
relations  are  like  the  delicate  vapor  of  water,  so  unstable 
there  is  always  danger  of  their  turning  to  rain,  or  frost, 
or  snow.  They  can  not  remain  long  in  suspense,  and  it 
is  while  in  suspense,  like  the  rose-cloud  of  heaven  turned 
toward  the  evening  sun,  that  they  are  most  beautiful. 
The  thought  that  Eben  was  going  from  her  was  exceed 
ingly  painful  to  Almira  in  spite  of  her  religion,  which 
came  in  as  a  prop  and  stay,  and  she  secretly  formed  the 
plan  of  looking  out  for  another  smart  boy  to  educate. 
No  girl  could  ever  prove  as  satisfactory  as  Eben  ;  she 
must  take  another  boy. 


ALMIRA' S  FEEBLE   EXCUSE,  137 

It  is  said  that  the  very  day  Eben  left  the  law  school 
with  his  parchment  in  his  pocket  he  came  straight  home, 
and  the  very  first  thing  he  did  was  to  offer  his  heart,  hand, 
and  prospective  fortune  to  his  benefactress.  It  seems  he 
had  been  thinking  of  this  for  some  years,  while  Almira 
had  been  praying  for  the  strength  to  give  him  up.  If  the 
heavens  had  fallen,  her  consternation  could  not  have  been 
greater.  She  thought  the  boy  had  gone  mad,  and  when 
he  convinced  her  he  was  perfectly  sane,  and  had  long 
cherished  the  purpose  of  making  her  his  wife,  it  is  said 
that  she  boxed  his  ears  roundly  and  turned  him  out  of 
the  house.  But  Eben  came  back,  not  once,  but  many 
times,  determined  to  win  her.  There  is  a  deeply-rooted 
belief  in  the  human  mind  that  any  woman  can  be  won  by 
persistent  effort,  and,  of  course,  Almira  did  yield  in  the 
end,  although  that  boy  Eben  was  twelve  years  her  junior. 

Nothing  has  ever  made  a  stir  in  the  village  to  be  com 
pared  with  the  marriage  of  Almira  and  Eben.  The  only 
explanation  she  could  give  her  friends  was  that  she  could 
not  live  without  Eben  because  she  had  brought  him  up, 
and  Eben  vowed  he  would  never  see  her  again  unless  she 
would  have  him.  It  was  a  feeble  excuse,  every  body  felt, 
from  a  woman  who  had  written  solemnly  in  her  journal 
at  the  age  of  sixteen  that  she  should  never  marry,  but 
devote  her  whole  life  to  God  and  the  education  of  youth. 
Almira  would  have  despised  any  body  else  who  might 
have  made  it.  They  were  married  at  a  certain  spot  in 
the  keeping-room,  just  in  front  of  the  old  fire-place,  with 
its  brass  andirons,  which  on  that  day  was  full  of  apple- 
blossoms. 

The  village  tried  to  adjust  itself  to  a  sense  of  its  loss, 
the  loss  of  its  invaluable  school-mistress,  the  cleverest 
woman  ever  "  raised  "  in  that  part  of  the  country.  But 
they  always  felt  she  had  taken  a  foolish  step,  and  lowered 
herself  from  the  high  pinnacle  of  a  perfect  school  ma'am, 
until  Eben  began  to  shine  forth  in  the  councils  of  the 


I38  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

state  and  nation,  and  then  a  new  theory  was  formed, 
which  has  lasted  to  this  day — *".  <?.,  that  Eben's  wife  had 
made  him ;  that  she  wrote  all  his  speeches,  and  without 
her  he  never  could  have  become  a  distinguished  man. 

To  the  imagination,  of  course,  this  marriage  was  not 
ideally  perfect,  but  it  turned  out  an  ideal  marriage  all 
the  same.  The  judge  and  senator  revered  his  wife  to 
the  last  day  of  his  existence,  and  treated  her  with  a  min 
gled  respect,  deference,  and  affection  beautiful  to  behold. 
Their  home  life  was  pointed  out  as  a  star-like  example 
among  the  homes  of  the  world.  Almira  began  to  grow 
young  from  the  day  she  was  wedded.  Her  children 
thought  her  the  most  delightful  of  beings.  She  softened 
her  creed  and  added  to  the  fullness  and  richness  of  her 
gowns.  It  was  true  she  did  make  her  husband.  He  was 
her  creation,  and  he  knew  it. 

Well,  it  was  pretty  in  the  daughter  to  come  back  to  the 
old  farm-house  and  be  married  on  the  exact  spot  in  the 
keeping-room,  the  same  day  of  the  month,  and  the  same 
hour,  when  her  mother  had  stood  up  to  marry  Eben. 


CHAPTER    XVI. 

ONE    SPRING    DAY    IN   HUGH'S  LIFE. 

HUGH  has  made  up  all  his  quarrels  and  differences 
with  his  neighbors,  and  as  a  result  of  this  closing 
of  the  temple  of  Janus  he  is  a  little  melancholy  and  low- 
spirited.  Perhaps,  however,  it  is  nothing  more  than  a 
disordered  liver  or  a  touch  of  spring  fever.  He  has 
worked  quite  steadily  most  of  the  winter  on  his  local 
history,  which  is  now  approaching  completion,  and  will 
be  published  by  subscirption  during  the  year.  With  the 
opening  of  spring  a  restless  wandering  fit  has  seized  the 
young  man,  and  he  starts  off  on  what  he  calls  round 
about  journeys,  interminable  rambles  to  the  distant  hills 
to  find  the  first  catkins  and  tree  blossoms  and  listen  to 
the  earliest  note  of  the  wood  thrush.  In  those  deep 
solitudes  he  indulges  in  his  Druidical  worship  of  nature, 
and  does  not  even  care  to  have  the  young  parson  along. 
Once  or  twice  this  spring  he  has  taken  Milly  on  a  long 
mountain  tramp,  and  Milly  has  carried  with  her  the  MS. 
volume  of  her  father's  poems  and  has  read  to  Hugh  the 
verses,  "  To  a  Lone  Tree  on  Saddleback,"  sitting  on  a 
mossy  log  near  where  a  spring  trickles  out  just  beneath 
the  roots  of  an  aged  oak.  The  landscape  lay  soft  as  a 
dream  below  them  in  the  blue  and  violet  haze  of  early 
spring.  They  could  hear  the  patter  of  sheep  among  the 
rocks  and  the  cries  of  young  lambs.  I  think  Milly  made 
up  her  difference  with  Hugh  after  the  Rastus  affair, 
when  she  found  he  had  inserted  a  handsome  notice  of  her 
father  in  the  local  history,  blinking  all  the  specks  upon 
the  man's  character  and  making  him  shine  as  a  poet  and 
a  gentleman. 


140  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

He  has  also  reconciled  himself  to  Judge  Magnus  by 
stopping  a  runaway  horse  attached  to  the  phaeton  of  the 
judge's  wife  ;  and  the  judge,  in  his  gratitude  to  the 
young  man  for  saving  that  excellent  woman  from  injury, 
has  forgotten  all  about  the  little  unpleasantness  which 
had  separated  them  for  over  a  year.  Now  Hugh  again 
has  the  run  of  the  house,  and  can  make  himself  pleasant 
to  the  young  lady  visitors,  can  carry  off  books  of  refer 
ence  from  the  library,  and  drop  in  any  time  to  dinner 
or  tea. 

Now  that  almost  every  body  has  tried  a  hand  at  settling 
Hugh  and  making  a  man  of  him,  the  judge  thinks  of 
taking  hold  of  the  job,  and  setting  him  up  in  a  law 
office  in  the  county  town,  where  he  can  throw  a  great 
deal  of  business  in  his  way.  Poor  Hugh  has  received 
the  proposal  almost  like  a  warrant  for  his  execution  ; 
and  in  order  to  indemnify  himself  for  future  privations, 
he  now  spends  most  of  his  time  in  those  roundabout 
rambles  of  which  I  have  spoken.  He  loiters  about  old 
fields  and  cow  lanes  in  the  mild  urbanity  of  spring  sun 
shine,  hangs  over  bars  and  gates,  sits  and  whittles  on 
old  stone  walls,  watches  the  frisky  calves  as  they  con 
sort  with  their  staid  mothers,  talks  to  the  men  who  are 
mending  the  road,  or  goes  and  smokes  with  the  quarry- 
men  in  Saw  Mill  Hollow.  One  of  his  favorite  tramps  is 
to  Cedar  Glen,  where  a  little  red  school-house  is  situated, 
of  which  Hugh  is  uncommonly  fond.  It  is  a  genuine 
country  school,  not  graded,  or  degraded,  by  modern 
fashions,  furnished  with  hacked  benches  and  with  walls 
defaced  by  successive  generations  of  bad  spellers.  About 
a  score  of  country  urchins  are  gathered  here  during  six 
months  of  the  year — three  months  in  the  spring  and  three 
months  in  the  fall.  The  school-mistress  is  not  at  all 
pretty,  nor  is  she  young.  She  has  an  acidulous  voice 
and  talks  through  her  nose.  Her  hair  is  Titian-red,  but 
the  scholars  do  not  admire  it  ;  they  take  it  for  just  what 


CEDAR   GLEX   SCHOOL.  141 

it  meant  in  the  old  days.  Hugh  likes  her  because  she  is 
a  remnant  of  a  past  age.  She  keeps  a  bundle  of  birch 
switches  hung  upon  the  wall  over  her  desk,  and  makes 
the  urchins  empty  their  pockets  regularly  every  morning 
before  the  classes  open.  This  juvenile  omnium  gatherum 
is  almost  as  great  a  delight  to  Hugh  as  a  collection  of 
flint  flakes  and  hatchets  from  the  stone  age. 

He  is  sometimes  allowed  to  sit  on  the  visitors'  bench 
and  listen  to  the  recitations,  and  he  has  picked  up  a  lot 
of  boys'  compositions  which  he  prizes  highly.  But 
Hugh  disgraced  himself  the  other  day  by  laughing  out 
in  school  at  the  wrong  time,  and  there  is  danger  of  his 
corrupting  the  scholars  by  slyly  giving  them  various 
small  tips.  The  occasion  of  the  disgrace  was  at  a 
moment  when  the  teacher  happened  to  ask  the  history 
class,  "  Who  was  Xerxes  ? "  and  a  boy's  hand  went  up 
quick  as  lightning.  He  happened  to  be  an  inveterate 
stammerer,  but  his  mind  was  so  congested  with  accurate 
knowledge  the  words  came  tumbling  out  of  his  mouth 
pell-mell  all  together  :  "  He  was  a  gen-er-al — a  very 
gre-gre-at  gen-gen-er-al,  but  I  d-d-don't  'member 
whether  he  f-f-fit  for  the  Union  or  the  'fe-fe-federates." 

The  teacher  gave  Hugh  a  severe  look,  and  he 
stumbled  out  of  the  school-house  and  allowed  his  laugh 
ter  to  explode  in  the  soft  spring  air.  Cedar  Glen  was  so 
still  no  sound  came  to  his  ears,  save  the  drone  of  chil 
dren's  voices  through  an  open  window  of  the  school 
house  and  the  caw  of  a  solitary  crow,  hanging  like  a 
little  black  speck  over  a  newly  plowed  field.  Hugh  made 
up  his  mind  the  next  time  he  visited  that  school  he  would 
slyly  reward  the  urchin  who  knew  so  much  about  Xerxes 
with  a  twenty-five-cent  piece.  He  had  secured  a  compo 
sition  from  Tim  Long,  the  best  composer  in  school,  which 
he  was  reserving  for  a  treat  when  he  sat  down  to  rest  in 
some  shady  nook  by  the  way. 

Cutting  across  the  hills  that  day,  Hugh  made  a  great 


I42  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

detour,  and  came  out  far  below  Burying-Ground  Hill. 
But  by  sturdy  walking,  as  the  sun  declined  westward,  he 
reached  a  little  evergreen  bower  on  the  far  side  of  the 
brook,  where,  through  loopholes  in  the  boughs,  though 
himself  well  hidden,  he  fully  commanded  Lovers'  Walk, 
and  could  see  and  hear  all  that  passed  on  the  other  side 
of  the  stream.  Hugh  often  resorted  to  this  place  ;  and 
he  had  made  for  himself  a  seat  of  stones,  backed  by  the 
sturdy  stem  of  an  old  oak.  It  had  occurred  to  him  that 
here,  undiscovered,  he  could  take  a  sly  peep  into  the 
little  romances  of  the  village,  but  up  to  this  moment 
nothing  but  the  most  prosy  commonplace  facts  had  ever 
leaked  through  the  crevices  of  his  bower. 

Now  Hugh,  when  he  had  comfortably  stretched  him 
self  out  to  rest,  drew  forth  Tim  Long's  composition.  It 
was  written  in  a  terribly  cramped  hand,  the  worst  school 
boy  pot-hooks  and  hangers,  on  a  soiled  half-sheet  of 
paper.  Here  it  is  : 

"  ON    MY    BROTHER     TOM. 

"  I  thot  I  would  -chose  to  rite  about  Tom  'cause  they 
say  he  is  a  blood  relation  of  mine  on  my  father's  side. 
Mothers  as  I've  ben  tole  ain't  no  blood  relations,  but 
they  is  suthin  nearer  they  is  kin.  Tom  is  a  small  boy  a 
good  sight  smaller  'n  I  be  but  he  feels  awful  big  and 
sassy.  When  he  got  his  new  boots  on  he  was  jest  ready 
to  bust  with  innerd  pride.  You  ort  to  see  Tom  when  he 
is  choke  full  of  importance.  It  would  make  you  sick. 
There  ain't  no  more  disgustin'  sight  than  a  small  one 
horse  boy  as  don't  respeckit  older  folks.  Tom  don't 
respeckit  me  as  he  ort.  He  don't  look  up  to  me  wuth  a 
cent.  When  I  want  to  put  my  chores  off  on  Tom,  as  is 
proper,  so  as  I  can  play  ball  with  the  older  fellers,  Tom 
he  don't  see  as  how  he  ort  to  look  up  to  me  and  mind 
'bedient,  but  he  runs  to  tell  mother  and  she  bein'  no 


A    BOY'S  COMPOSITION.  143 

blood  relation  only  nearest  of  kin  ginerally  takes  his  part. 
I  think  there  is  no  more  disgustin'  sight  than  a  small  boy 
as  runs  to  his  ma  or  his  pa  to  tell  on  a  big  feller  like  me. 
I  never  did  it  'cause  how  I  was  the  oldest  brother  of  the 
fambly.  They  say  in  the  Sunday-school  as  how  brothers 
ort  to  love  each  other.  I  should  love  Tom  a  great  sight 
more  if  he  respeckit  me  as  he  ort.  This  is  all  I  can 
think  of  to  say  about  my  brother  Tom  only  he  had 
mumps  and  measles  one  winter  and  had  to  take  nasty- 
tasted  stuff.  I  didn't  ketch  mumps  and  measles.  When 
I  do  ketch  'em  an'  have  to  take  nasty  doctor's  stuff — 
Tom  won't  be  very  sorry.  He  won't  go  round  all  day 
with  his  finger  in  his  eye.  He's  a  hard-hearted  little 
chap  is  Tom.  This  is  all  about  Tom  except  as  he  has 
got  a  bull-pup  as  can  siccum  jest  like  an  old  dorg." 

Hugh  had  been  enjoying  this  composition  in  the  shade 
of  the  cedars,  when  who  should  stray  down  "  Lovers' 
Walk  "  that  delicious  spring  afternoon,  actually  hand-in- 
hand,  like  a  pair  of  babes  in  the  woods,  but  Rose  Madder 
and  the  young  artist,  Mr.  Hubert  Milletseed,  who  won 
so  much  glory  last  season  by  drawing  Jake  Small's  eccen 
tric  domicile.  He  carried  Rose's  hat  on  his  arm  half- 
filled  with  ferns  and  spring  flowers,  and  his  eyes  were 
turned  on  the  down-cast  orbs  of  the  young  lady  impres 
sionist  in  a  way  to  show  how  true  it  is  that — 

"  In  the  spring  a  young  man's  fancy  lightly  turns  to  thoughts 
of  love." 

He  has  come  back  to  the  village  and  taken  up  his  abode 
for  another  season,  and  it  is  now  known  that  Mr.  Millet- 
seed  recommended  Rose  Madder  to  Peckham  when  she 
secured  the  studio  over  the  grocery  store.  He  has  turned 
out  to  be  an  old  friend.  Milletseed  is  poor  but  cour 
ageous.  He  has  worn  thesame  artist's  coat  and  slouched 
hat — which  gives  him  the  air  of  a  retired  bandit — for 
several  years.  Rose  is  also  very  poor.  But  two  pover- 


J44  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

ties  when  united  make  only  one.  Thus  there  is  a  dis 
tinct  mathematical  gain  in  getting  married.  Between 
them  they  can  save  the  hire  of  one  studio.  He  will 
always  have  some  one  to  pose  for  him  without  paying  a 
model  by  the  hour.  He  will  also  secure  a  life-long 
admirer  of  his  pictures,  who  will  enter  into  all  his  artist's 
quarrels,  condole  with  him  when  his  works  are  badly 
hung  in  the  exhibitions,  and  sympathize  with  the  most 
secret  sentiment  of  his  breast,  the  belief  that  he  is  unap 
preciated. 

Rose,  on  her  part,  will  always  now  have  some  one  at 
hand  to  know  at  once  when  she  makes  a  good  pose,  and 
gets  into  a  proper  light,  and  becomes  effective  about  the 
hair  and  eyes.  Moreover,  he  likes  those  puffed  elbow- 
sleeves,  and  big  hats,  and  skimpy  skirts  embroidered  with 
distracted  landscapes  and  flights  of  birds.  He  sees  a 
great  deal,  too,  in  those  pathetic  bits  of  mullein  stalk  and 
thistle-head  stuck  up  on  the  sage-green  Canton  flannel 
curtain  in  Rose's  studio.  He  thinks  she  has  improved 
since  she  began  to  sketch  the  wayside  weeds  of  the  vil 
lage  under  a  white  cotton  umbrella.  Milletseed  can  see  the 
divine  in  a  thistle-head  as  easily  as  in  a  whole  Yosemite 
Valley.  And  oh,  what  sketching  excursions  they  will 
take  together  in  the  blissful  time  to  be,  when  one  white 
umbrella,  if  large  enough,  can  be  made  to  answer  for 
two  !  They  were  talking  softly  of  even  more  blissful 
things  than  these  as  they  passed  down  Lovers'  Walk. 

Hugh  was  the  first  to  discover  the  pretty  secret,  and  it 
made  him  rather  blue  there  in  his  little  tent  of  closely 
woven  evergreen  branches.  Rose  had  gone  from  him. 
All  the  nice,  desirable  girls,  to  whom  he  had  been  impar 
tially  attentive,  would  be  taken  from  him.  Like  Ko-Ko, 
he  would  at  last  be  forced  to  wed — 

"  A  most  unattractive  old  thing 
With  a  caricature  of  a  face" — 
perhaps  the  Titian-red-headed  school-mistress  at  Cedar 


WORLDLY    WISEMAN    WINS   THE  DAY.          145 

Glen.  He  felt  savage  toward  Milletseed  for  taking  Rose 
away  from  him,  yet  never  for  a  single  moment  had  he 
thought  seriously  of  wedding  Rose  Madder. 

The  unexpected  always  happens,  and  as  Mrs.  Deacon 
Hildreth  says,  "  Things  happen  in  a  bunch."  Hugh  had 
scarcely  roused  himself  from  his  somber  mood,  as  he 
watched  the  birds  carrying  sticks  and  straws  to  their 
nests,  conscious  that  he  had  too  long  neglected  to  build 
his  own  nest,  when  his  attention  was  attracted  by  the 
sound  of  a  man's  step  crunching  the  little  stones  of 
Lovers'  Walk,  and  the  heels  of  a  light  womanly  pair  of 
boots  clicking  in  unison.  Suddenly  at  a  little  turn  in 
the  path  appeared  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman  in  spotless 
dress,  looking  down  with  a  happy  air  of  ownership  on 
the  eldest  Miss  Bee,  that  nice,  practical,  utilitarian  girl, 
who  had  been  especially  selected  for  his  (Hugh's)  wife. 
She  was  clad  in  a  new  spring  costume,  and  wore  a  large 
bunch  of  yellow  flowers  in  her  hat,  while  her  hands  were 
filled  with  hot-house  roses,  the  gift  of  Mr.  Wiseman. 
Great  heavens  !  it  was  now  plain  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman 
had  not  been  after  the  middle  Bee,  that  decorative 
maiden  assigned  to  him  by  common  rumor,  but  had  cast 
his  eyes  upon  the  eldest  sister,  set  off  and  apportioned 
to  Hugh  if  he  cared  to  put  forth  his  hand  and  take  her. 
In  regard  to  the  unfortunate  affair  of  the  serenade,  a  rec 
onciliation  had  been  brought  about  through  the  kindly 
offices  of  the  old  miller.  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman  lost  no 
time  in  bringing  the  affair  to  a  business-like  conclusion. 
It  has  turned  out  that  Miss  Bee  always  admired  that  fine 
place  on  Main  Street,  and  has  had  an  ambition  to  light  a 
candle  in  our  social  world  that  shall  outshine  the  wax 
taper  of  Mrs.  Judge  Magnus.  As  to  Mr.  Worldly  Wise 
man  himself,  she  says  girls  can't  be  quite  so  particular 
when  they  have  passed  the  age  of  twenty-five. 

This  new  revelation  left  Hugh  quite  stunned  and 
dazed.  Two  of  his  old  flames  had  been  taken  from 


*4  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

him,  and  in  the  case  of  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman,  he  felt 
like  at  once  sending  that  gentleman  a  challenge.  To  be 
sure,  two  other  delightful  Bees  remained  unappropriated, 
and  there  were  many  other  uncaught  fish  in  the  sea,  but 
the  sense  of  injury  still  remained  and  rankled  in  his 
breast.  The  climax  of  the  afternoon,  however,  was  yet 
to  be  reached,  and  it  brought  Hugh  back  to  his  usual 
exuberance  of  spirits.  It  was  the  most  delicious  little 
mystery,  and  the  clew  was  thrown  into  his  hands  like  a 
ball  tossed  accidentally  over  the  fence. 

For,  coming  down  Lovers'  Walk,  in  the  soft  spring 
checker-work  of  light  and  shade,  he  saw  no  other  than 
Drusilla,  the  village's  only  and  own  Drusilla,  dressed 
in  her  usual  brown  stuff  gown,  with  the  strings  of  her 
bonnet  untied  and  floating  on  the  breeze.  She  looked 
quite  flushed  and  handsome  in  spite  of  her  avoirdupois 
and  the  strictly  business  air  she  carried  into  all  the  af 
fairs  of  life.  Beside  her  walked  a  tall,  black-habited 
thin-chested  clerical  pefson,  with  long  hair  combed 
very  sleek  behind  his  ears,  and  a  prominent  pair  of 
eye-glasses.  He  appeared  weak  about  the  lungs,  and 
stooped  slightly  as  he  peered  into  his  companion's  face, 
with  an  anxious,  deferential,  beseeching  look.  He  had 
put  his  hand  under  Drusilla's  elbow,  although  she  in  her 
abounding  vigor  could  easily  have  picked  him  up  from 
off  the  ground.  They  were  in  deep  and  earnest  confab, 
and  Hugh,  hidden  behind  the  clump  of  evergreens, 
could  not  help  hearing  a  few  words  that  passed  between 
them  : 

"  I  can  not  desert  my  mother  while  she  lives,  and  she 
is  now  too  old  to  leave  her  home." 

"  I  would  not  ask  it,  dearest  Drusilla  ;  we  will  both 
stay  beside  her  and  soothe  her  declining  years." 

These  were  the  words  Hugh  heard  :  "  Dearest  Dru 
silla  !  "  He  rolled  over  on  the  moss  and  dead  leaves,  and 
nearly  choked  in  the  effort  to  suppress  his  laughter  ;  and 


DR  U  SILL  A  '  S  DISCIPLINE.  1 4  7 

as  the  evening  shadows  gathered,  he  crept  out  of  his 
bower  and  took  his  way  home  with  his  old  spirit  of  mis 
chief  all  in  arms.  In  a  few  days  Hugh  had  gathered  as 
much  information  about  Drusilla's  little  romance  as  she 
herself  possessed.  For  a  long  time  the  village  looked 
upon  it  as  an  impossible  joke.  Drusilla  being  a  rich 
woman,  of  course  malicious  things  are  said.  The  con 
sumptive-looking  thin-chested  parson  is  now  out  of  a 
parish,  and  is  much  in  need  of  a  nurse.  To  Drusilla  a 
husband  will  be  only  another  bond  slave  and  subject 
menial.  She  is  already  regulating  the  diet,  in  fact,  the 
whole  course  of  her  fiance  s  existence,  on  her  own  theory 
of  hygiene.  He  will  henceforth  only  be  allowed  to  eat 
each  day  so  many  ounces  of  highly  nutritious  brain  food. 
Drusilla  has  ordered  in  dumb-bells  and  a  lifting-machine. 
She  intends  that  he  shall  lift  so  many  pounds  morning 
and  evening  until  he  can  heave  a  thousandweight.  The 
mild  cigar  he  was  want  to  smoke  in  the  evening,  rather 
under  the  rose,  has  been  sternly  prohibited.  The  tea 
and  coffee  which,  as  a  man  of  studious  habits,  he  has 
always  taken  in  considerable  quantities,  have  been  inter 
dicted.  He  is  not  to  drink  any  thing  but  hot  water, 
quarts  of  hot  water,  deadly  hot — hot  enough  in  fact  to 
scald  his  midriff.  His  meat  is  weighed  out  to  him,  just 
so  much  a  meal,  and  no  attention  is  paid  to  his  sensations 
of  hunger  or  thirst.  He  is  obliged  to  eat  gluten  bread, 
a  dreadful  compound  which  Drusilla  sends  for  to  a  neigh 
boring  town.  Saint  Patty  is  rather  glad  Drusilla  has 
taken  up  a  new  reform  in  the  shape  of  a  prospective  hus 
band,  as  it  leaves  the  dear  old  lady  more  freedom  to  in 
dulge  her  own  individual  weaknesses.  She  likes  the  Rev. 
Arthur  Meeker,  and  calls  him,  with  a  sly  little  laugh, 
"  Drusilla's  tame  cat."  She  rather  hopes  that  after  they 
are  married  and  Meeker  gets  plump  and  well  on  Drusilla's 
system  of  training,  he  may  assert  himself  and  put  down 
his  domestic  tyrant. 


H8  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

Of  course  Drusilla  will  not  abdicate  as  village  man 
ageress  when  she  marries.  Her  great  mind  is  equal  to 
half-a-dozen  villages, — and  shall  I  venture  to  say  it  ? — 
several  husbands.  Our  young  clergyman  now  hopes  that, 
as  Drusilla  has  a  parson  of  her  own,  she  will  let  him  alone. 
But  he  hopes  against  all  probability.  As  soon  as  the  pres 
ence  of  Mr.  Meeker  was  accounted  for,  and  Drusilla's 
romance  made  known,  every  body  was  saying,  "Where  did 
Drusilla  pick  him  up  ?  "  Hugh  alone  has  ferreted  out  the 
whole  story,  and  he  chuckles  over  it,  and  keeps  it  to  him 
self  to  tantalize  the  neighbors. 

It  seems  that  some  months  ago  Drusilla  was  taking  a 
night  journey  alone  on  a  river  steamboat,  when  a  collision 
occurred  in  the  darkness  of  the  early  morning,  and  a  large 
hole  was  stove  in  the  steamer's  side.  The  wildest  con 
fusion  ensued  at  once  among  the  distracted  passengers, 
but  Drusilla  was  up  and  fully  dressed,  bag  and  bundle  in 
hand.  In  the  dark  saloon  where  the  lamps  had  gone  out 
a  man  ran  against  her  crying  piteously,  "  Who  will  show 
me  how  to  put  on  my  life  preserver  ?  "  "I  will,"  said 
Drusilla,  with  promptness  and  dispatch,  although  in  the 
dim  light  she  could  scarcely  see  his  face.  She  buckled 
on  his  life  preserver,  helped  him  to  gather  his  things,  and 
finally  assisted  him  into  the  boat  which  took  them  off 
from  the  sinking  steamer.  He  confessed  to  Drusilla  that 
he  was  nearly  scared  to  death,  but  she  was  perfectly  cool 
and  collected,  and  showed  no  nervous  tremors  on  the  oc 
casion.  Rev.  Arthur  Meeker  someway  believed  Drusilla 
had  saved  his  life.  She  was  just  the  prop  and  support 
he  had  long  been  seeking  ;  and  Drusilla — well,  Drusilla 
after  all  is  a  woman. 


.       CHAPTER  XVII. 

THE    HELP    QUESTION    AT    FRASER    FARM. 

PEACE  over  the  farm  lands,  peace  in  the  deep  valleys, 
peace  in  the  forest,  where  scarce  an  opening  leaf 
stirs  in  the  wind.  The  pale  spring  dawn  is  breaking  over 
the  still  world,  and  the  light  spreads  faint  and  tremulous 
on  the  trunks  of  the  trees  and  blanches  the  sky  to  a  pure 
white  pallor.  Th'e  young  blossoms  coming  out  in  the 
orchards  and  gardens  seem  a  part  of  the  pearly,  dew- 
bespangled  whiteness  of  the  dawn.  The  stars  glide  back 
into  infinite  depths.  The  walking  ghosts,  if  there  be 
any,  flee  to  the  graveyard.  The  village  houses  look  into 
each  other's  curtained  eyes  like  strangers.  The  farms 
on  the  distant  hillsides  come  out  in  luminous  patches. 
The  mist  rolls  up  from  the  river,  making  a  long,  milky 
serpent,  as  it  winds  through  the  valley,  solid  like  marble. 
The  flowers  open  their  cups,  and  the  grass  glistens 
faintly.  Still  it  is  a  silvery  world,  strangely  denuded  of 
color,  though  clear  and  solemn.  Hark  !  there  is  a  bird 
singing  a  solo.  It  is  a  catbird  ;  it  balances  itself  on  the 
top  of  a  young  maple  and  sings  until  all  the  place  about 
seems  flooded  with  delicious  melody. 

Now  the  sun  is  fairly  up,  and  has  dipped  its  beam  as 
low  as  Eraser's  Farm  on  the  intervale,  where  the  white 
veranda  shines  eastward  with  a  pleasant  invitation  to 
enter.  Eraser's  is  one  of  the  best  farms  hereabouts,  and 
Eraser  himself  is  very  forehanded.  To  be  sure,  he  is 
somewhat  bent,  and  looks  older  than  he  ought  to  for  a 
man  of  his  years.  But  the  soil  in  our  part  of  the  world 
takes  toll  of  youth  and  good  looks  in  return  for  the  gift 


15°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

of  good  harvests  and  independence.  Fraser  has  much 
fine  imported  stock  in  his  pastures.  He  went  into  choice 
cattle-raising  before  it  became  the  fashion,  and  his 
stock-barns  and  yards  have  long  been  a  show  for  the 
village.  Fraser  went  to  California  during  the  gold  fever, 
but  he  found  there  was  more  money  in  farming  than  in 
gold  digging,  and  he  came  home  and  invested  what  he 
had  saved  in  his  parental  acres  on  the  intervale,  to  which 
he  has  largely  added  in  the  course  of  years. 

He  did  not  marry  young,  and  when  he  chose  a  wife 
he  took  a  town-bred  woman,  who  has  proved  more  prac 
tical  and  efficient  than  most  country  girls.  She  is 
buxom,  cheerful,  and  merry,  a  real  lover  of  country  life, 
and  not  averse  to  the  management  and  work  of  the  farm. 
She  loves  flowers,  books,  and  music,  and  has  aimed  to 
blend  the  enjoyments  of  her  early  girlhood  with  the  inev 
itable  cares  of  her  married  state.  Her  children  are  still 
young.  The  boys  can  not  yet  be  of  any  service  to  their 
father,  and  the  little  girls  are  only  just  beyond  baby 
hood.  The  labor  problem  is  the  vexed  question  in  this 
prosperous  household,  as  in  so  many  others.  Farm  life 
is  somewhat  easier  for  the  farmer's  wife  than  of  old,  for 
the  milk  is  now  sent  to  the  creamery.  There  is  no  mak 
ing  of  butter  or  cheese  save  for  the  family.  But  with 
the  heats  of  summer  come  haying  and  harvesting  and  a 
great  increase  to  the  household.  The  farmer  can  obtain 
his  extra  hands  when  he  wants  them,  -but  the  farmer's 
wife  finds  herself  overburdened  with  a  multitude  of  new 
cares,  and  often  no  helper  can  be  obtained  for  love  or 
money. 

The  American-born  country  girl  seldom  goes  out  to 
service  now,  or  if  she  does  she  is  comparatively  worth 
less.  She  is  generally  a  frail  creature,  with  a  weak  chest, 
who  can  do  no  heavy  work.  She  must  sit  at  the  family 
table  and  "  eat  with  the  rest  of  the  folks,"  and  she  not 
unfrequently  addresses  the  head  of  the  house,  with  easy 


AMERICAN-BORN  HELP.  151 

familiarity,  as  "  John  "  or  "  Henry."  She  has  a  beau 
who  comes  to  take  her  out  riding  in  a  smart  new  buggy 
once  or  twice  a  week,  and  she  dresses  a  great  deal  better 
than  her  mistress.  Camp-meetings,  picnics,  and  plat 
form  dances  come  in  to  disturb  the  mind  of  the  rustic 
American  maid.  She  stipulates  that  she  is  not  to  milk 
or  wash,  or  do  any  heavy  lifting.  Besides,  she  expects 
to  get  married  soon  and  has  gone  out  to  service  mainly 
for  the  purpose  of  making  up  her  wedding  clothes  on  the 
family  sewing  machine.  She  is  unhealthy  and  eats  little 
but  pie  and  pickles.  She  wears  a  rose  in  her  hair,  and  a 
hole  in  her  stocking,  and  when  she  goes  out  to  pick  peas 
she  puts  on  a  small  hat  and  a  nose  veil.  She  reads  the 
Ledger  and  the  Family  Newspaper  up  in  her  bedroom  by 
a  smoky  kerosene  lamp,  and  she  principally  dotes  on 
pop-corn  balls,  prize  packages  of  candy,  soda  water,  and 
one  plate  of  ice-cream  with  two  spoons.  Her  biscuits 
are  speckled,  like  Cairngorm  pebbles  ;  her  bread  is  of  a 
grayish  white,  solid  as  lead  and  warranted  to  keep  in  all 
climates.  Her  fried  steak  and  boiled  coffee  are  enough 
to  make  St.  Jerome  get  up  and  use  mildly  profane  lan 
guage  to  his  old  toothless  lion. 

Mrs.  Fraser  knows  all  about  American  "  help  "  in  sev 
eral  of  her  moods  and  most  of  her  tenses.  When  the 
American  "  help  "  has  done  her  best  to  imbitter  Mrs. 
Eraser's  sunny  temper,  and  to  spoil  her  sweet  reasonable 
ness,  and  when  she  has  summarily  got  rid  of  the  latest 
specimen,  she  tells  her  husband  that  she  is  going  to  do 
the  work  alone  for  a  time,  or  with  Uncle  Hiram's  help, 
and  her  eyes  sparkle  and  her  cheeks  are  quite  rosy  with 
excitement.  She  is  so  happy  to  have  done  with  the 
"  help  "  she  goes  singing  all  over  the  house,  and  the  way 
the  windows  fly  open,  and  the  beds  are  shaken,  and  the 
rooms  swept  and  dusted,  is  quite  delightful  to  behold. 
Mrs.  Fraser  renews  her  youth.  She  forgets  that  she  pos 
sesses  a  back  or  ever  had  a  touch  of  neuralgia  in  the 


152  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

head.  Uncle  Hi,  too,  shares  in  the  excitement  of  what 
he  calls  "  the  great  clearing  out  sale  of  American  help." 
Uncle  Hi  is  perhaps  a  distant  relative  of  John  Fraser. 
At  any  rate,  he  has  lived  with  him  a  great  many  years, 
refusing  wages,  and  letting  Fraser  and  his  wife  buy  his 
clothes  for  him,  and  even  provide  him  with  tobacco. 
Uncle  Hi  is  such  a  delightful  oddity,  the  farm  people 
think  if  he  had  not  been  born  it  would  have  been  neces 
sary  to  invent  him.  He  is  a  plain  little  man,  with  a  queer 
face  full  of  puckers  that  slowly  fill  with  sunshine  wh 
laughs  ;  and  a  humorous  quip  comes  as  naturally  to  the 
end  of  his  tongue  as  a  rose  to  the  tip  of  its  stalk.  Uncle  \ 
Hi  seldom  wears  a  "  boiled  "  shirt  except  on  Sunday. 
Other  days  he  appears  in  flannel,  with  a  bright  blue  ging 
ham  necktie,  which  exactly  matches  the  color  of  his  eyes. 
He  is  scrupulously,  charmingly  clean,  like  a  marigold  or 
a  hollyhock.  His  hands  are  big,  knotty,  malformed  by 
labor,  exaggerated  at  the  joints,  brown  as  a  berry,  with  a 
little  white  hairiness  about  them,  but  they  are  the  best 
and  kindest  hands  in  the  world.  Children  love  the  feel 
of  them.  Uncle  Hi  has  brought  up  all  the  Fraser  chil 
dren  thus  far— has  rocked  them  to  sleep  many  a  night  in 
his  arms,  when  the  mother  was  ailing  and  the  father  tired 
out  with  a  hard  day's  work  ;  has  even  taken  them  all 
away  to  his  own  chamber,  which  is  just  as  odd  and  just  as 
scrupulously  clean  as  Uncle  Hi  himself  is,  where  he  tells 
the  children  those  marvelous,  impossible  tales  that  make 
the  eyes  bulge  out  of  their  heads,  while  they  suck  in  their 
breath  with  a  sound  of  awesome  delight.  He  has  a  world 
of  sentiment  in  his  soul.  Up  in  that  queer  chamber,  as 
in  a  museum,  he  has  preserved  mementoes  of  the  chil 
dren's  babyhood — little  shoes  and  broken  playthings. 
He  has  so  many  things  of  the  little  one  who  died  Mary 
can  scarcely  ever  bring  herself  to  go  in  there. 

Such  is  Uncle  Hiram,  the  farm  stand-by.     Mrs.  Fraser 
says  if  every  thing  else  fails,  she  knows  Uncle  Hi  and  the 


UNCLE  ///  AS  A   HELPER.  153 

ice  crop  can  be  depended  upon.  As  soon  as  the  last 
*'  help  "  moves  out  Uncle  Hi  moves  in.  Fraser  has  only 
to  say  to  him,  "  Mary  wants  you,"  and  he  drops  his  hoe 
or  his  scythe  and  starts  for  the  house.  They  begin  by 
shoveling  the  debris  of  the  last  domestic  out  of  the 
kitchen.  Then  they  sweep  and  scrub  and  finally  put  on 
the  fine  touches.  Mary  is  happy,  and  Uncle  Hi  is  full 
of  his  odd  sayings.  He  sticks  that  last  help's  character 
as  full  of  jokes  as  a  toilet  cushion  is  full  of  pins.  Mrs. 
Fraser  has  been  wonderfully  helped  over  the  rough  places 
of  life  by  Uncle  Hi's  fun,  and  he  almost  enjoys  having 
the  "  help  clear  out  "  so  that  he  can  cheer  up  Mary. 

When  the  house  has  been  cleaned  from  top  to  bottom 
Hiram  brings  in  blossoms,  cherry  and  apple  blossoms  in 
the  spring,  and  Mary  embowers  the  chimney-pieces,  and 
every  thing  looks  so  bright  and  charming  she  is  in  love 
with  her  home,  feeling  that  once  more  it  is  her  own. 
She  brews  delicious  tea  and  coffee,  and  the  warm  bread 
and  feathery  cakes  come  sweet  and  fragrant  out  of  the 
oven.  All  the  cookery  smells  good,  and  is  so  appetizing 
the  men  and  children  eat  more  than  they  otherwise  would. 
So  it  goes  on  for  a  time  until  Mary  breaks  down  with  one 
of  her  neuralgic  headaches,  and  Uncle  Hi  "  goes  off  his 
head."  Without  her  he  can  do  nothing.  He  is  only  high 
private  ;  never  was  born  to  be  captain,  so  he  says.  He 
must  always  be  under  somebody,  and  as  he  loves  Fraser 
and  his  wife  and  the  children,  he  is  glad  to  be  under 
them.  So  when  Mary  is  ill  the  web  flies  out  of  the  frame, 
as  it  did  with  the  Lady  of  Shalott,  and  Fraser  is  quite 
lost.  Of  course,  help  must  be  got  into  the  house. 

Mrs.  Fraser  has  tried  the  Irish  in  all  their  phases. 
Uncle  Hi  says  if  Gladstone  had  as  much  practical  expe 
rience  of  the  Irish  home  rule  as  they  have  had  on  their 
farm,  he  would  know  a  thing  or  two.  A  raw  Irish  maid 
on  a  farm  is  rather  a  queer  animal.  Although  Ireland 
has  always  been  an  agricultural  country,  she  has  but  the 


J54  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

slightest  conception  of  the  use  of  implements  and  the 
meaning  of  rustic  processes  and  procedure.  Her  pro 
pensity  to  blunder  causes  her  to  put  the  cart  before  the 
horse  until  she  has  painfully  been  taught  better.  There 
is  a  certain  good  humor  about  her  which  makes  it  pleas- 
anter  to  have  her  in  the  house  than  the  hysterical  gum- 
chewing  American  "  help."  But  she  is  always  "  kilt 
entirely  "  by  the  deadly  loneliness  of  the  place.  She 
sees  nothing  companionable  in  nature.  The  sound  of  the 
bull-frogs  and  the  cheep  of  the  birds  at  sunset  bring  no 
hallowed  associations  with  the  bogs  and  the  bog-trotters 
of  her  native  Erin.  If  there  is  an  Irish  hired  hand  on  the 
place,  she  may  console  herself  a  little  chaffing  him  in  the 
stable  or  in  the  garden.  She  does  not  spend  as  much 
time  as  her  American  sister  crimping  her  hair  or  reading 
the  Ledger  in  bed,  but  she  must  attend  the  Roman  Catho 
lic  church,  distant  three  miles,  at  least  once  every  Sun 
day.  The  man  is  obliged  to  drive  her  over,  while  the 
master  stays  at  home  from  church  and  does  his  chores, 
and  the  mistress  works  hard  all  the  morning  to  cook  the 
Sunday  dinner  and  have  it  nice  and  hot  by  the  time 
Bridget  and  Patrick  return. 

The  graces,  especially  the  goddess  of  handiness  did 
not  stand  by  and  bless  the  cradle  when  the  average  Irish 
maid  was  born.  Her  work  lacks  finish,  and  has  that 
raggedness,  which  sets  the  teeth  of  a  nice  housekeeeper  on 
edge.  Her  bedclothes  are  pitchforked  on  to  the  bed, 
her  tablecloth  is  awry.  The  glass  and  the  knife  stand 
on  the  wrong  side  of  the  plate.  The  soup  plates  are 
brought  on  when  dessert  plates  should  be  handed.  The 
clothes  are  ironed  wrong  side  out.  The  night-shirts  are 
starched  and  the  day  shirts  left  limp.  All  the  photo 
graphs  are  put  upside  down  on  the  chimney-piece.  The 
best  vase  is  fractured  and  the  cracked  side  put  to  the  wall, 
in  hope  the  mistress  may  not  see  it.  The  crockery  soon 
begins  to  look  as  if  it  had  been  along  with  the  bull  in  the 


THE    GERMAN  FRAULEhV.  155 

china  shop.  Every  thing  in  the  house  feels  the  heavy 
hand  of  the  fair  maid  of  Erin.  She  breaks  the  stove- 
covers  and  smashes  the  flat-irons.  She  wrenches  the 
clothes-horse  apart  opening  it  the  wrong  way.  The  dog 
is  given  his  dinner  in  the  best  glass  preserve  dish.  There 
isn't  a  sound  chair  left  to  sit  on.  Her  lovely  counte 
nance  cracked  the  looking-glass  before  she  had  been  in 
the  house  a  week.  But  she  is  a  good-natured  creature, 
and  there  is  much  in  her  to  like,  only,  as  Uncle  Hi  says, 
it  is  necessary  to  turn  her  adrift  or  the  house  would  be 
hopelessly  wrecked.  It  takes  a  year  to  replace  what  he 
calls  her  "  tare  and  tret." 

Well,  Mrs.  Fraser  has  tried  the  German  maiden,  that 
slow,  flaxen-haired,  ox-eyed  fraulein.  She  came  one 
summer  day  in  a  woolen  cap  and  a  thick  jacket  fastened 
with  clumsy  metal  buttons,  and  carrying  an  old  country 
carpetsack  of  immense  weight.  She  was  the  most  peace 
able  and  the  most  quietly  obstinate  person  in  the  world. 
She  loved  animals  and  would  have  been  happy  to  spend 
all  her  time  among  the  calves,  and  pigs,  and  cows.  She 
had  no  objection  to  a  lonely  situation,  and  being  a  Prot 
estant,  was  quite  indifferent  to  church  services.  Her 
plodding,  quiet,  patient  nature  would  have  been  inval 
uable  on  the  farm  but  for  an  ineradicable  tendency  to 
greasy  cooking  and  the  onion  flavor.  Her  baked  beans 
swam  in  oil  ;  even  her  fruit-pies  bore  the  effluvia  of  gar 
lic.  Uncle  Hiram,  who  is  a  mystic  worshiper  of  the 
New  England  national  dish,  has  adapted  a  sentimental 
stanza  to  describe  the  fragrance  of  Gretchen's  culin 
ary  art  : 

"  You  may  break,  you  may  shatter  the  dish  if  you  will, 
But  the  scent  of  the  onion  will  cling  round  it  still." 

So  Gretchen,  with  all  her  stolid  virtues  and  negative 
excellences,  had  to  go,  and  Mrs.  Fraser  and  Uncle  Hiram, 
having  cleaned  the  house  as  usual,  and  made  themselves 


I56  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

happy  with  the  blessed  consciousness  that  they  owned 
the  premises,  and  were  free  for  the  moment  from  the 
plague  of  hired  servants,  began  to  look  in  the  newspapers 
for  one  of  those  companionable,  nice,  educated  women 
who  advertise  their  grateful  services  in  return  for  a  home 
and  a  modest  stipend.  Such  a  reduced  lady  they  thought 
would  at  least  have  nice  refined  ways.  She  would  never 
leave  kitchen  and  cellar  in  the  condition  of  a  pigsty,  and 
her  cooking,  if  she  did  any,  would  be  dainty  and  delicate. 
It  would  be  pleasant  to  take  in  a  companionable  person, 
who  loved  the  country  for  its  own  sake,  and  could  find 
something  social  in  nature  when  human  society  was  not 
at  hand.  They  would  make  her  quite  at  home.  Mary 
Fraser,  who  is  rather  imaginative,  pleased  herself  pictur 
ing  a  decayed  gentlewoman  whom  she  could  make  her 
friend  ;  how  pleasant  to  do  the  work  together,  and  then 
to  sit  down  and  read  some  congenial  book  in  company. 

So,  after  looking  over  a  great  many  advertisements  of 
ladies  in  search  of  a  country  home,  who  would  be  glad 
to  take  a  position  as  housekeeper,  Mrs.  Fraser  entered 
into  correspondence  with  some  of  them,  and  the  result 
was  that  on  a  beautiful  May  day  Uncle  Hiram  drove  the 
lady  help  and  her  trunk  over  from  the  village.  This 
decayed  gentlewoman  was  of  an  uncertain  age,  occupy 
ing  the  debatable  ground  somewhere  between  thirty  and 
fifty.  But  as  she  was  well  made  up,  with  false  hair  and 
teeth,  and  a  suspicion  of  rouge  on  her  cheek-bones,  time's 
ravages  did  not  count  for  so  much.  She  wore  a  large 
bustle  and  quite  a  gay  hat,  and  appeared  to  be  supplied 
with  considerable  jewelry  for  a  person  in  distressed  cir 
cumstances.  She  was  painfully  ungrammatical,  as  Mary 
noticed  at  once,  and  her  little  dream  of  self-culture  in 
company  with  the  new  assistant  tumbled  into  dust. 

The  next  morning  she  came  down  with  her  bustle  and 
her  jewelry  on,  as  if  she  were  a  guest  in  the  house.  Mrs. 
Frazer,  in  her  clean  gingham  gown  and  freedom  from 


A    DECAYED   GENrLE  WOMAN.  157 

jewelry,  cosmetics,  and  cheap  perfumery,  began  to  feel 
herself  quite  put  in  the  shade  by  the  new-comer.  Mary 
watched  the  effect  she  produced  on  the  other  members 
of  the  family.  They  all  called  her  Miss  Pinchback,  and 
Uncle  Hiram,  she  could  see,  brushed  his  hair  up  a  little 
more  on  top  of  his  head,  and  even  John  Fraser  thought 
he  must  be  more  particular  about  his  dress-when  he  came 
in  to  meals.  Miss  Pinchback,  in  her  rings  and  bangs, 
offered  to  work  the  day  after  her  arrival,  and  the  mistress 
of  the  house  set  her  to  dusting  rooms  and  making  beds. 
But  in  the  middle  of  the  forenoon  Mary  found  the  beds 
unmade.  Miss  Pinchback  was  lonely,  and  had  gone  out 
to  talk  with  the  men.  In  less  than  two  days  she  knew 
every  male  creature  for  quite  a  circuit  round  ;  and  in  her 
frank  devotion  to  the  other  sex  she  soon  began  to  ignore 
the  mistress  of  the  house.  She  waved  her  handkerchief 
out  of  window  to  the  butcher,  and  blew  kisses  to  the 
peddler,  and  kept  the  hired  man  from  his  work,  hanging 
over  the  gate  to  talk  to  him.  She  followed  Uncle  Hi  all 
about  the  place,  and  insisted  on  driving  off  with  him  in 
the  farm-wagon  when  he  went  to  the  store  or  the  mill. 
Uncle  Hi,  modest  old  bachelor  that  he  was,  said  he  didn't 
like  Pinchback's  free  ways,  but  it  was  evident  to  Mary 
Fraser  that  the  simple  soul  was  rather  flattered  by  her 
attentions. 

One  day  the  mistress  of  the  house  had  occasion  to  step 
out  into  the  barn,  and  there  she  saw  Pinchback,  in  all  her 
finery,  sitting  on  an  overturned  bushel  basket,  and  talk 
ing  very  amicably  to  John  Fraser  ;  as  she  said,  making 
great  eyes  at  him.  John  was  leaning  on  his  pitchfork, 
looking  at  the  woman  with  some  curiosity,  and  it  must 
be  confessed  not  without  a  certain  air  of  interest.  Still, 
like  Uncle  Hi,  he  has  always  said  he  could  not  bear  the 
sight  of  her.  Well,  Mrs.  Fraser  did  a  very  unreasonable 
thing  for  a  woman  who  declares  she  never  has  felt  a 
twinge  of  jealousy  in  her  life.  She  stole  back  home  and 


I58  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

sat  down  in  the  rocking-chair  and  shed  a  few  bitter  tears. 
She  resolved  that  Pinchback  should  leave  the  house  that 
day,  but  how  to  get  rid  of  her  was  the  question.  She 
resolved  to  search  her  room  for  a  clew  to  those  nice,  lady 
like  letters  she  had  received  from  town  signed  with  her 
name,  for  she  had  discovered  that  Miss  Pinchback  wrote 
a  villainous  hand  and  spelled  like  a  Hottentot.  It  was 
while  searching  her  chamber  that  Mrs.  Fraser  discovered 
quite  unexpectedly  a  few  of  her  own  possessions — her 
mother's  wedding  ring,  a  locket  with  the  picture  of  her 
little  boy  who  died,  and  various  pieces  of  wearing 
apparel  marked  with  her  name.  Miss  Pinchback  went 
away  quite  suddenly  that  afternoon,  and  since  that  time 
Mrs.  Fraser  has  been  a  strong  advocate  for  the  intro 
duction  of  Chinese  cheap  labor. 


CHAPTER  XVIII. 

THE     DELIGHTFUL     MAJOR. 

'  PHE  cherry  trees  are  already  casting  down  little  show- 
1  ers  of  white  petals  every  time  the  wind  sways  them. 
They  sno',v  down  into  the  grass  and  drift  in  the  ruts  of 
the  road.  The  gnarled  apple  trees  in  some  neglected 
orchards  of  natural  fruit  are  bossed  all  over  their  warty 
arms  with  bright  nosegays.  If  you  search  in  the  grass 
beneath  you  will  find  clusters  of  deep  blue  violets  mixed 
with  buttercups  and  dandelions. 

Every  hour  brings  out  something  to  admire  along  the 
village  street.  The  maples  are  casting  down  their  pale 
green  and  bright  red  keys.  The  poplars  are  shedding 
fringy  blossoms.  In  every  flower-bed  something  is 
abloom  ;  here  the  lily  of  the  valley  ;  there  the  hyacinth 
and  bright  tulip  ;  over  the  wall  daffodils,  jonquils,  and 
snow-drops.  The  past  few  days  have  spread  a  tent  of 
gauzy  green  over  the  street,  and  brought  the  delicious 
sense  of  virginal  freshness,  peaceful  growth,  and  expan 
sion  conveyed  in  the  odors  of  plants,  and  the  cooing  of 
doves  in  the  sun,  the  clucking  of  hens,  the  peep  of  young 
birds,  the  skimming  of  swallows  as  they  wheel  about  old 
barns  and  make  slim  shadows  on  the  sunny  ground. 

I  think  of  dear  Major  B.  now,  when  the  trees  are  in 
blossom  and  the  door-yard  shrubs  are  out  in  their  glory. 
He  was  as  fresh  and  breezy  as  the  lilacs,  as  full  bloom  as 
the  peonies,  as  innocent  as  the  snow-balls,  and  as  welcome 
as  the  new-mown  grass.  You  ought  to  have  seen  him 
in  his  white  waistcoat — he  always  preferred  a  white  waist 
coat  when  the  day  was  the  least  warm — twirling  his 


160  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

little  cane  and  dangling  his  eye-glass.  He  nearly 
ruined  himself  in  gold  eye-glasses  and  white  waist 
coats,  but  they  were  his  only  vices.  He  did  not  drink, 
or  smoke,  or  use  profane  language,  except  in  moderation, 
and  yet  the  major  had  seen  much  rough  service  on  the 
frontier.  He  was  almost  as  expansive  as  the  judge — not 
quite,  perhaps,  in  the  way  of  omniscience — and  his  self- 
conceit  was  less  aggressive.  He  loved  so  artlessly  to  be 
admired,  his  vanity  was  like  that  of  a  young,  kittenish 
woman. 

You  should  have  seen  him  engaged  in  controversy  with 
the  judge  as  they  strolled  together  down  the  village 
street,  taking  up  all  the  sidewalk.  The  judge's  right 
hand  grasped  his  gold-headed  cane  in  the  middle  and  per 
formed  all  kinds  of  figures  and  flourishes  in  the  air.  The 
major's  hand  clutched  the  hook  of  his  little  cane  and 
performed  an  equal  variety  of  extraordinary  antics. 
Their  voices  were  both  loud  and  penetrating,  and  as  they 
strolled  along  much  of  their  talk  flew  into  open  doors  and 
windows.  Except  for  a  great  hearty  laugh  which  burst 
forth  now  and  then,  the  people  would  have  thought  they 
were  quarreling. 

The  major  was  strenuous  on  the  increase  of  the  United 
States  Army.  That  a  great  and  glorious  country  like 
ours  should  be  represented  by  a  mere  handful  of  regulars 
seemed  to  him  the  result  of  the  most  shameful  cheese 
paring  policy.  The  judge,  on  the  other  hand,  contended 
that  large  standing  armies  are  a  menace  to  a  free  govern 
ment,  and  backed  his  opinion  by  quoting  familiarly  from 
Senator  This  and  Governor  That.  He  even  cited  the 
head  of  the  government  on  this  subject,  intimating  that 
the  great  man  had,  in  a  moment  of  confidence,  said  things 
to  him  he  never  would  have  spoken  to  any  other  human 
being.  The  major,  on  the  other  hand,  had  seen  service, 
had  smelt  gunpowder,  sir,  and  heard  the  bombs  and  can 
non  balls  whizzing  about  his  head.  He  had  the  proper 


AM  ADORER   OF  FEMALE    CHARMS.  l6l 

military  contempt  for  the  opinion  of  any  civilian,  however 
high  in  place  and  power. 

Hotly  as  the  contest  might  rage  over  this  moot  point, 
the  major  never  failed  to  see  the  pretty  face  of  village 
maid  or  matron  if  one  chanced  to  appear  at  a  window  or 
on  the  street  ;  and  he  would  dart  away  from  the  side  of 
the  judge  or  whoever  he  happened  to  be  engaged  with  at 
the  moment,  to  investigate  the  phenomenon  a  little  nearer. 
"  You  know,"  he  would  say  apologetically,  and  with  the 
most  perfect  candor  and  naivete,  "  I  have  been  so  long 
away  on  the  frontier  among  the  Indians,  where  the  women 
are  all  hideous,  I  am  starved  for  the  sight  of  female  love 
liness.  It  isn't  my  fault  that  I  was  made  a  devotee  of 
beauty.  I  do  not  drink  drams  or  smoke  expensive  cigars, 
but  I  must  occasionally  indulge  my  penchant  for  the 
sight  of  a  pretty  woman." 

The  fact  that  the  major  was  starving  for  the  sight  of 
female  loveliness,  because  he  had  been  so  long  on  the 
frontier  among  the  Indians,  went  all  over  the  village,  and 
was  commented  on  by  the  gossips  with  varying  degrees 
of  spite,  acrimony  and  uncharitableness.  A  few  saw  its 
humorous  side,  and  judged  that  the  major  was  perfectly 
simple  and  guileless.  Others  remarked  that  having  no 
female  beauty  at  home,  he  was  forced  to  enjoy  the  sight 
of  it  where  he  could.  The  poor  major  contended  that 
he  was  just  what  God  had  made  him,  and  not  personally 
responsible.  Some  men  are  fond  of  music,  others  have 
a  passion  for  painting  and  sculpture  ;  for  his  part  he 
worshiped  the  living  art  that  lies  in  the  ruby  lip,  the 
rosy  cheek,  the  sunny  locks  of  adorable  womankind. 
Most  of  the  pretty  girls  and  handsome  matrons  came  in 
time  to  take  the  major's  part.  They  judged  rightly  that 
there  was  no  harm  in  the  creature,  and  certainly  he  was 
very  amusing.  No  wonder  he  was  a  little  weak  in  the 
upper  story,  having  lived  so  long  among  the  Indians, 
poor  thing.  They  voted  not  to  mind  his  monkey-shines, 


1 62  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

but  to  get  as  much  enjoyment  out  of  him  as  they 
could. 

The  major's  wife  was  a  tiny  woman,  coming  just  up  to 
his  shoulder,  not,  in  fact,  a  bit  higher  than  his  heart. 
She  was  undeniably  pale  and  plain,  except  for  a  pair  of 
soft  brown  eyes  and  a  trim  little  figure,  which  was  itself  a 
kind  of  beauty.  She  always  dressed  in  dark  shades  of 
gray  or  slate,  in  a  little  straight  skirt  and  a  small  tight- 
fitting  jacket.  Her  hats  were  devoid  of  the  least  orna 
ment.  No  touch  of  brightness  came  to  their  monotonous 
mouse-color — not  a  bud  or  flower  even  in  the  spring, 
when  all  nature  is  so  exuberant.  It  was  certain  the 
major  could  not  find  local  color  in  his  menage  save  what 
he  provided  in  his  own  florid  person.  And  yet  how  he 
loved  it  !  No  man  ever  adored  beauty  as  he  did.  Why 
had  he  chosen  this  little  gray  mate,  who  beside  him  looked 
like  a  tiny  ground-bird  beside  some  tropical  songster  ? 

There  were  always  three  little  care  lines  in  the  middle 
of  her  forehead,  and  she  commonly  looked  as  if  she  were 
mentally  calculating  the  amount  of  the  week's  washing, 
or  doing  some  other  little  domestic  economy  sum  in  her 
head.  The  major's  white  waistcoats,  and  gloves,  and 
canes  had  to  be  paid  for  out  of  rather  a  small  income, 
and  this  was  no  doubt  one  reason  why  the  major's  wife 
dressed  in  slate-color.  She  was  soon  known  all  over  the 
village  as  "Hetty,"  for  thus  the  major  habitually  spoke 
of  her,  and  when  he  was  not  talking  of  his  great  depri 
vations  among  the  Indians,  and  the  criminally  absurd 
condition  of  the  United  States  Army,  he  generally  did 
talk  of  Hetty.  Sometimes  he  met  the  little  woman  face  to 
face,  when  he  was  escorting  a  whole  bevy  of  pretty  girls  on 
a  walk,  and  was  up  in  the  seventh  heaven  of  bliss.  It  is 
rather  trying  to  be  confronted  by  one's  lawful  better-half 
at  such  a  moment,  but  the  unembarrassed  major  was 
always  equal  to  the  situation.  "  My  dearest  Hetty,"  he 
would  cry  out,  "  where  are  going  in  the  heat  (or  the  damp, 


HETTY'S  FRIEND.  163 

as  the  case  might  be)  ?  You  ought  to  be  at  home  this  min 
ute,  taking  care  of  your  sciatica."  Mrs.  Hetty's  sciatica 
became  another  village  joke.  She  did  not  at  all  take 
good  care  of  it.  When  she  met  her  husband  and  the 
girls  in  this  manner  she  was  generally  going  with  some 
little  comfort  in  her  hands  to  visit  a  sick  child  or  a  poor, 
tired  woman.  Probably  because  she  had  a  fancy  for 
paying  these  little  visits  to  humble  folks  and  leaving  a 
thin  wake  of  light  behind  her,  was  another  reason  why 
Hetty  always  dressed  in  that  old  slate-colored  gown. 

The  major's  wife  had  one  great  friend  and  advocate  in 
the  village.  There  was  at  least  one  person  who  believed 
in  her  wholly,  and  sounded  her  praises  among  the  neigh 
bors  who  seldom  saw  any  thing  in  her  to  admire.  This 
discerner  of  spirits  was  old  Dr.  Rivington.  He  became 
almost  as  fond  of  Hetty  as  if  she  had  been  his  own 
child.  But  in  proportion  as  he  admired  her  he  disliked 
the  poor  major.  The  aesthetic  side  of  the  doctor's  nature 
not  having  been  well  developed,  he  could  not  appreciate 
the  cruel  privations  the  major  had  suffered  among  the 
Indians,  nor  the  necessity  for  indemnifying  himself  which 
the  major  so  keenly  felt.  When  he  would  pass  some  vil 
lage  house  where  the  major's  loud  frank  voice  came 
through  the  open  window,  mingled  with  the  laughter  of 
girls,  the  doctor  would  grasp  his  knotted  stick,  and  look 
tremendously  fierce  and  pugilistic.  He  wanted  to  make 
the  fellow  who  neglected  such  a  gem  of  a  wife  feel  the 
weight  of  that  bit  of  oak,  he  said  to  himself,  as  he  strode 
on  his  way. 

Of  course  every  body  talks  in  a  small  village,  and  soon 
there  came  to  be  floating  specks  and  wisps  of  gossip  all 
through  the  air  about  the  major  and  Sibyl  Pringle.  Miss 
Pringlewas  one  of  those  handsome,  rather  wild  and  fear 
less  maidens,  who  have  a  faculty  for  getting  themselves 
talked  about  in  country  society.  She  had  been  engaged 
to  a  young  man  who  V.MS  obnoxious  to  Pringle,  appar- 


1 64  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

ently  for  no  other  reason  but  because  old  Pringle  was  an 
obstinate,  hard-bitted  old  man,  who  had  contrived  to 
make  the  most  of  his  large  family  of  children  quite  mis 
erable  while  they  remained  at  home.  Sibyl,  at  her  father's 
command,  had  broken  the  engagement,  but  on  good 
ground  it  was  supposed  that  she  was  still  secretly  at 
tached  to  the  man  she  had  sent  away.  Owing  to  her  dis 
appointment,  perhaps,  Sibyl  had  grown  rather  reckless, 
and  unmindful  of  appearances,  and  did  things  the  staid 
village  matrons  who  had  outgrown  all  their  young  im 
pulses  and  errant  fancies,  looked  upon  askance.  Miss 
Sibyl  was  decidedly  handsome,  with  large  black  flashing 
eyes  and  a  damask  rose  complexion.  She  was  a  style  of 
beauty  the  major  particularly  admired,  although  being  a 
distinguished  connoisseur  of  female  loveliness,  he  enjoyed 
any  thing  good  of  its  kind — a  golden  blonde  almost  as 
much  as  a  sparkling  brunette.  Old  man  Pringle  took  an 
unaccountable  fancy  to  the  major.  He  liked  his  bold 
martial  air,  and  felt  his  house  honored  by  the  visits  of  a 
military  man.  Miss  Sibyl,  too,  was  evidently  pleased  to 
receive  him,  and  the  major's  hearty  voice  was  heard  issuing 
from  the  cracks  of  the  Pringle  mansion  more  frequently 
than  from  any  other,  and  the  major's  martial  form  was 
seen  escorting  Sibyl  Pringle  up  and  down  the  street  in 
open  daylight,  quite  without  shame,  as  the  people  said 
who  peeped  from  their  windows  in  hope  of  catching  their 
neighbors  in  the  commission  of  sin. 

Of  course  the  major's  wife  could  see  a  great  deal  for 
herself  if  she  kept  her  eyes  open.  But  there  were  kind 
people  who  felt  it  their  duty  to  inform  her  of  what  was 
said  in  certain  houses  in  the  village,  and  one  day  on  com 
ing  home  from  a  delightful  stroll  with  Sibyl  through 
Burying-Ground  Walk,  the  major  found  his  wife  pros 
trate  on  the  sofa,  suffering  from  sciatica  or  something 
worse.  She  may  have  been  crying  ;  at  any  rate,  her  eyes 
looked  suspiciously  red.  She  was  a  gentle  little  woman, 


HETTY'S  CRUDENESS.  165 

and  long  suffering,  as  we  know,  but  now  she  opened  her 
batteries  upon  the  major  without  giving  him  time  to  look 
to  his  ammunition.  She  laid  the  terrible  charge  directly 
at  his  door  of  paying  entirely  too  much  attention  to  Sibyl 
Pringle.  He  had  set  the  neighbors  talking  and  destroyed 
his  wife's  peace  of  mind.  The  poor  major  was  terribly 
scandalized.  He  felt  his  honor  as  an  officer  and  a  gentle 
man  impugned,  and  his  first  impulse  was  to  go  out  and 
shoot  somebody  ;  some  one  of  those  gossiping  people  who 
had  allowed  their  tongues  to  wag  to  the  injury  of  Hetty's 
peace.  "  Haven't  I  told  you,"  he  exclaimed,  "  that  a 
beautiful  woman  is  no  longer  a  person  to  me  ?  She  is  a 
cult,  a  worship.  Think  of  Dante  and  his  blessed  Bea 
trice.  In  certain  moods  of  the  mind  she  becomes  an  ab 
straction,"  he  went  on,  waving  his  hand  as  he  stood  over 
Hetty,  prostrate  there  on  the  sofa.  "  I  have  convinced 
you,  Hetty,  how  crude  it  is  to  cherish  a  feeling  of 
jealousy." 

"  Then  I  am  crude,"  moaned  the  major's  little  wife, 
"  and  I  don't  believe  that  Pringle  girl  is  one  bit  more  of 
an  abstraction  than  I  am." 

"  Hetty,  Hetty,  you  are  as  suspicious  as  these  back 
biting  neighbors  ;  and  you  know  very  well  how  long  I 
was  obliged  to  endure  the  sight  of  those  hideous  Ind — " 

"  Oh,  don't  mention  them"  choked  Hetty.  "  I  wish 
we  were  out  there  now,  away  from  this  dreadful  Pringle 
girl  with  all  the  village  folk  tattling.  I  wish  you  had  to 
look  at  squaws  for  the  remainder  of  your  life." 

The  major  picked  up  his  little  wife  from  the  state  of 
moral  and  physical  collapse  into  which  she  had  fallen,  and 
he  contrived  to  make  it  up  with  her,  and  to  convince  her 
that  she  had  been  very  much  in  the  wrong,  while  he  on 
his  part  promised  to  observe  a  little  more  discretion  in 
the  pursuit  of  his  devotions  at  the  shrine  of  female 
beauty. 

But  things  went  on  much  the  same  as  ever.     The  exu- 


1 66  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

berant  major  escorted  the  ladies  with  strict  impartiality, 
but  he  did  not  entirely  discontinue  his  visits  to  Sibyl 
Pringle,  because  it  would  look  too  marked  after  all  that 
had  been  said  ;  and  besides  old  Pringle  kept  inviting  him 
to  come  to  his  house.  The  people  watched  Hetty,  and 
they  were  at  a  loss  to  know  whether  to  admire  or  to  de 
spise  her,  when  they  saw  that  she  went  about  her  little 
affairs  quite  unconcerned. 

However,  one  morning  in  mid-May,  when  the  trees  were 
out'  nearly  in  full  leaf,  there  was  a  great  commotion  in 
the  village.  Sibyl  Pringle  had  disappeared  on  the  pre 
vious  day.  She  had  taken  a  ticket  on  the  railroad  to  the 
county  town  to  do  some  shopping,  promising  to  return 
at  night,  and  the  discovery  had  been  made  later  that  all 
her  clothes  had  disappeared.  The  major,  it  turned  out, 
also  was  missing.  He  had  hired  a  horse  at  the  village 
livery-stable,  and  leaving  it  at  the  next  station  to  be  sent 
back,  had  also  taken  the  train.  In  a  few  hours  news 
was  brought  to  Hetty  that  the  major  had  eloped  with 
Sibyl  Pringle.  The  depot  stage  was  passing  at  the 
moment,  and  Hetty  hailed  it,  and  hastily  tying  on  her 
bonnet  with  cold,  trembling  fingers,  she  put  herself  in 
the  vehicle,  and  rode  over  to  the  station.  There  she  found 
old  Pringle  telegraphing  for  news  of  his  lost  girl  in  all 
directions  and  swearing  most  horribly.  The  doctor  was 
also  there,  as  he  happened  to  be  attending  the  station- 
master's  wife  ;  and  when  Hetty  stole  into  the  waiting- 
room,  where  a  number  of  villagers  were  talking  excitedly, 
he  went  up  to  where  she  sat  pale  and  calm  in  her  corner, 
and  stood  before  her  to  partially  screen  the  poor  little 
thing  from  observation,  and  to  give  her  a  chance  to  re 
lieve  her  feelings  if  she  should  wish  to  cry.  He  tried  to 
get  hold  of  some  appropriate  word  of  consolation,  but 
his  tongue  blundered,  and  he  merely  muttered  to  him 
self,  "  The  scoundrel  !  He  isn't  fit  to  live  !  " 

"  What — what  do  you  mean  ?  "  and  Hetty's  clear  eyes 


A     WIFE'S  FAITH.  167 

looked  up  out  of  her  pale  face  in  a  way  that  staggered 
the  doctor. 

<l  What  do  you  mean  ?  You  don't  wish  to  say  you  still 
believe  ?  " 

"  Indeed,  I  do,"  cried  Hetty,  her  eyes  ablaze  with 
righteous  indignation.  u  It  is  all  a  ridiculous  mistake. 
He  has  never  dreamed  of  running  away  with  that  Pringle 
girl.  I  tell  you  he  can  not  live  without  me.  I  am  as 
necessary  to  my  husband  as  the  air  he  breathes.  These 
people  with  their  spiteful  tongues  have  tried  to  make 
mischief.  They  are  always  thinking  evil  of  others,"  and 
she  waved  her  hand  in  an  inclusive  way  hard  for  the  doc 
tor  to  bear.  "  I  tell  you,"  she  went  on,  getting  quite 
angry,  "  he  will  come  back  to  me  on  the  next  train,  and 
all  will  be  explained." 

The  old  doctor  looked  at  her  with  mingled  awe  and  rev 
erence  and  pity.  If  she  were  not  demented,  she  was  cer 
tainly  worthy  of  worship.  The  next  train  would  not  ar 
rive  from  anywhere  for  an  hour  and  a  half,  and  the 
waiting-room  gradually  emptied.  The  people  cast  curi 
ous  glances  at  Hetty  as  they  went  out,  but  she  sat  quite 
composed,  without  heeding  any  of  them.  Presently  there 
was  no  one  left  except  old  Pringle,  who  was  watching 
the  clicking  telegraph  instrument,  the  major's  wife,  and 
the  doctor.  Hetty  ignored  them  both,  and  as  for  old 
Pringle,  she  hated  the  very  sight  of  him,  without  the 
least  touch  of  sympathy  for  him  a£  a  fellow-sufferer. 
The  doctor  paced  up  and  down  the  platform,  keeping  his 
eye  on  the  motionless  little  woman  in  the  corner.  She 
might  need  his  services  before  all  was  over.  It  was  a 
long,  tedious  time,  but  it  did  end  at  last.  The  train 
rushed  down  the  track,  slowed,  then  stopped,  with  many 
a  snort  and  whistle.  Only  a  few  people  alighted,  and 
the  last  to  step  out  was  a  stoutish,  beaming  gentleman  in 
a  light  overcoat,  with  a  rose  in  the  buttonhole.  Well, 
Hetty  fell  sobbing  and  laughing  into  the  major's  arms, 


1 68  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

as  she  gave  the  doctor  a  terrible  look  of  reproach.  Old 
Pringle  rushed  up  to  the  major,  brandishing  his  clinched 
fist,  and  crying  out  excitedly  : 

"  What  have  you  done  with  my  girl  ?  " 

The  major  paid  no  heed  to  any  one  but  his  wife. 
"  My  dear,  why  are  you  so  agitated  ?  Have  the  neigh 
bors  been  filling  your  head  with  foolish  stories  ?  I  had 
to  go  away  on  a  little  private  business — nothing  less  than 
seeing  two  worthy  young  people  who  love  each  other 
dearly  united  in  the  bonds  of  matrimony.  I  promised 
my  old  friend,  Frank  Drummond,  I  would  help  him  in 
this  business,  and  pledged  myself,  on  my  honor  as  an 
officer  and  a  gentleman,  not  even  to  tell  my  wife.  Miss 
Pringle  is  no  longer  Miss  Pringle  ;  she  is  Mrs. 
Frank " 

Old  man  Pringle  would  not  let  the  major  finish  the  sen 
tence.  He  danced  up  and  down  with  rage,  and  would 
have  assaulted  him  if  the  doctor  had  not  restrained  his 
violence  and  taken  him  home  by  main  force. 

In  a  few  days  Hetty  called  at  the  doctor's  office  to  say 
good-by,  looking  bright  and  happy.  The  doctor  took 
her  hand  and  gazed  with  paternal  kindness  into  her  good 
little  face. 

"  And  are  we  to  lose  you,  my  dear  ?  I  am  sorry,  very 
sorry.  Where  are  you  going  ?  " 

u  Oh,  the  major  has  been  ordered  back  to  the  frontier 
among  the  Indians.  Of  course  it  is  very  hard  for  him, 
poor  fellow,  but  I  rather  like  that  kind  of  life." 


CHAPTER  XIX. 

A    ROSEBUD    GARDEN    OF    GIRLS. 

THE  wistaria  is  hanging  its  purple  clusters  high  on 
the  chimneys  of  the  old  Myers  house,  which  stands 
on  the  turnpike  just  outside  the  village  limits.  The 
garden  and  grounds  look  neglected  ;  of  late  years  the 
old  house  has  not  been  occupied.  But  great  bushes  of 
the  spirea  trail  their  white  wreaths  through  the  grass, 
and  the  syringa  and  althea  hedge  has  overgrown  the 
palings,  and  the  snowball  is  now  in  full  perfection. 
Great  clusters  of  the  blue  iris  and  striped  grass  struggle 
through  the  wild  growth.  The  climbing  roses  are  getting 
ready  to  push  out  pink  buds.  There  is  a  corner  given 
up  to  the  delightful  barberry,  with  its  sprays  gemmed 
with  tiny  yellow  flowers,  and  near  it  stands  a  large  dog- 
wood  tree,  brought  thither  from  the  woods,  covered 
thickly  with  white  flowers. 

All  things  look  celestial  now,  and  yet  how  fleeting 
is  the  delicate  tracery  and  flutter  of  young  leaves,  the 
exquisite  unspoiled  green,  so  tender  and  fresh  it  seems 
to  have  been  made  for  better  and  happier  beings  than 
any  this  workaday  world  produces.  The  delicious  bloom 
and  fragrance,  the  beauty  of  blossoms  so  delicate,  spirit 
ual,  and  affecting,  is  very  short-lived.  We  seem  always 
to  miss  the  best  of  it,  because  we  do  not  get  out  in  time 
to  catch  nature  at  her  prettiest  revels.  It  belongs  to  the 
youngest  and  fairest  creatures — happy  children,  merry 
maidens,  nestlings  and  lambs,  and  to  the  few  old  and 
middle-aged  people  whose  hearts  are  entirely  innocent 
and  uncorrupted. 


I  7°  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

This  freshness  of  the  spring-time  brings  back  that 
quintette  of  charming  girls  who  lived  once  at  the  old 
Myers  place,  when  the  doors  and  windows  stood  wide 
open  all  day  long,  and  the  old  garden,  with  its  tall  shade 
trees  and  bright  flower  beds,  was  like  Armida's  enchanted 
grounds.  The  professor's  five  daughters,  with  their 
sunny  heads  and  fluttering  skirts,  seemed  always  flitting 
about  under  the  maples  and  elms  and  buttonballs.  The 
sun  glanced  lovingly  down  on  them  as  they  picked  vivid 
handfuls  of  petunias  and  nasturtiums  and  morning- 
glories,  and  the  trees  threw  soft  shadows  on  their  white 
gowns.  They  lifted  the  edges  of  their  petticoats  out  of 
the  dew  and  showed  delightful  little  slippers  and  clocked 
stockings.  The  place,  so  silent  now,  was  then  always 
full  of  a  subdued  murmur  of  sweet  voices,  of  chat  and 
laughter  and  snatches  of  old  songs  and  little  airs  played 
impromptu  on  the  ancient  piano  which  had  been  their 
mother's. 

The  father  of  these  charming  girls,  companions  of  the 
spring,  had  been  for  many  years  in  a  theological  semi 
nary  in  one  of  the  staid  New  England  towns,  where 
every  house  was  as  prim  and  orthodox  as  the  West 
minster  Catechism.  When  some  years  past  middle  life 
the  professor  retired  from  his  post,  and  bought  the  old 
Myers  place,  a  property  which  had  once  been  in  his  wife's 
family,  and  where  he  had  courted  her  twenty-five  years 
earlier.  He  brought  with  him  this  bevy  of  five  daughters- 
Only  one  of  them  was  at  all  plain,  and  she  was  the  house 
keeper,  good  little  Lois,  named  for  her  mother.  The 
others  were  charmingly,  irresistibly  pretty.  How  such 
rare  blossoms  came  to  flower  on  the  professor's  rather 
dry  family  tree  it  is  impossible  to  say.  But  there  they 
were,  indubitable  facts,  delightful,  unaccounted-for  phe 
nomena,  like  tropical  birds  singing  in  the  cell  of  an 
anchorite,  or  little  love  poems  inserted  between  firstly 
and  fifteenthly  of  an  old  yellow  sermon. 


THE   FOUR   BEAUTIES.  \1\ 

The  mother  had  been  dead  only  a  few  years  when  the 
professor  moved  back  to  the  village  with  his  family  of 
girls.  On  the  mother's  side  there  were  wealthy  relatives, 
who  lived  in  nice,  lively  towns,  where  there  were  plenty  of 
eligible,  or,  as  Mrs.  Deacon  Hildreth  would  say,  "  'legi 
ble  "  young  men.  These  relatives  were  always  inviting 
their  cousins  and  nieces  to  stay  with  them  weeks  and 
months  at  a  time.  They  were  fashionably  clothed  by 
this  loving  bounty,  and  taken  off  on  delightful  trips  to 
the  mountains  and  the  seashore  in  summer,  and  to  Florida 
in  winter.  The  result  of  all  this  was  that  the  four  young 
beauties  were  all  engaged  when  they  first  came  to  live  in 
the  village,  three  of  them  to  town  men,  and  the  fourth 
and  youngest — a  little  blonde,  with  curly  hair  and  gray 
eyes,  with  dark  eyebrows — to  a  young  theological  student 
at  the  seminary  where  her  father  had  taught  for  nearly  a 
quarter  of  a  century. 

Lois  was  still  heart-free,  and  it  happened  that  though 
nice-looking  and  such  a  good  girl,  she  was  not  a  decided 
beauty.  Therefore,  however  illogical  it  may  seem,  she 
was  expected  to  be  practical  and  to  take  to  housekeeping. 
The  question,  such  a  burning  one  in  New  England, 
"  what  shall  I  do  with  my  girls  ? "  had  been  easily  an 
swered  for  the  professor.  They  were  all,  or  nearly  all, 
soon  to  enter  that  holy  estate  of  matrimony  which  was 
the  primal  solution  of  the  problem,  and  in  spite  of  modern 
improvements,  is  still  by  the  majority  of  mankind  con 
sidered  the  best.  It  is  a  terrible  piece  of  work  having 
four  engaged  girls  in  the  house  at  one  time,  as  poor  Lois 
found  to  her  cost.  It  is  not  necessary  to  mention  that 
engaged  girls  are  good  for  little  or  nothing  in  a  practical 
way.  They  are  always  writing  and  receiving  intermin 
able  letters.  The  day's  mail  puts  them  in  the  seventh 
heaven  of  bliss,  or  sends  them  to  bed  with  a  headache. 
Nothing  can  be  done  but  to  count  the  hours  before  he 
will  come  (in  this  case  it  was  t/iey),  to  curl  hair,  and  try 


J?2  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

on  becoming  gowns  and  sashes,  and  gather  nosegays  in 
the  garden — to  improvise  sentimental  strains  on  the  old 
piano,  to  cry  over  a  novel,  or  to  dream  in  the  hammock, 
utterly  distraught  as  to  the  every-day  things  of  this  life. 

Poor  Lois  had  experience  of  all  kinds  of  lovers'  moods. 
She  had  so  many  confidences  poured  into  her  ear  she 
forgot  sometimes  whether  it  was  Frank  who  had  last 
quarreled  with  Jane,  and  then  kissed  and  made  up,  or 
Paul  with  Grace.  She  took  to  wearing  her  rings  on 
different  fingers  in  order  to  keep  the  secrets  separate  and 
distinct  in  her  mind.  She  was  expected  to  sympathize 
with  every  body,  and  to  enter  into  every  body's  feelings, 
because  she  was  not  supposed  to  have  any  feelings  of  her 
own.  If  she  was  ever  a  little  slow  or  obtuse  in  unravel 
ing  the  webs  of  love's  diplomacy,  the  remark  was  made 
with  rasping  emphasis,  "  you  would  know  just  how  it  is  if 
you  had  ever  been  engaged."  The  poor  girl  was  nearly 
distracted,  for  the  economic  problem  was  of  even  greater 
difficulty  than  the  entanglements  of  the  heart.  There 
were  always  one  or  two  lovers  on  hand  to  be  lodged  and 
fed,  and  others  might  arrive  at  any  moment.  Lois  dis 
covered  to  her  cost  that  being  in  love  does  not  injure  the 
male  appetite  ;  however  much  engaged  young  men  may 
disregard  an  unengaged  prospective  sister-in-law,  or  look 
upon  her  as  an  object  of  covert  pity,  they  fully  appreci 
ate  her  batter-cakes  and  waffles,  her  tender  steak  and  fra 
grant  coffee. 

The  case  of  the  old  professor  seemed  even  more 
pathetic  than  that  of  his  eldest  daughter.  He  moved 
about  in  a  cool  remoteness,  feeling  at  times  terribly  alien 
to  love's  young  dreams,  and  then  again,  catching  the 
infection  of  the  house,  his  old  heart  would  begin  to  beat 
with  a  strange  flutter.  The  girls  were  all  very  fond  of 
papa.  They  petted  him  a  great  deal,  and  called  him  an 
old  darling,  and  sat  on  his  lap,  and  curled  his  gray  locks 
over  their  pretty  fingers  while  they  coaxed  out  of  him  all 


THE  PROFESSOR'S  HOBBY.  173 

manner  of  little  favors.  Still  he  could  never  quite  over 
come  the  feeling  that  these  lovely  bright  beings  ought 
to  belong  to  some  one  else.  It  was  simply  ridiculous  that 
he,  an  old  seminary  professor,  who  had  made  a  great  deal 
of  dry  wood  in  the  long  years  he  had  taught  theology  in 
an  ugly  little  town,  mainly  to  young  rustics,  and  with  one 
sole  and  only  hobby,  the  freedom  of  the  will,  should  be 
the  father  of  such  a  group  of  sirens.  The  professor  was 
spare  in  flesh,  and  wore  his  gray  locks  rather  long.  He 
was  excessively  short-sighted,  and  had  a  way  of  peering 
at  things  common  to  persons  thus  afflicted.  He  was 
rather  absent-minded,  and  now  that  he  found  himself 
away  from  the  routine  of  seminary  life,  with  no  college 
bell  to  guide  him,  he  would  have  forgotten  to  eat  if  his 
daughter  Lois  had  not  recalled  him  to  the  necessity.  He 
was  gentle  and  slow  of  speech,  and  no  great  talker,  but 
with  that  habit  of  iteration  and  reiteration  to  the  point  of 
tediousness  so  common  to  life-long  instructors. 

The  professor  had  formerly  made  for  himself  a  study 
in  the  old  seminary  building,  and  here,  abstracted  and 
apart  from  all  family  cares,  he  had  written  his  various 
books  on  the  freedom  of  the  will,  which  gave  him  a  very 
solid,  substantial  reputation  in  clerical  circles.  Though 
I  have  never  chanced  to  meet  any  one  who  had  read  them, 
the  professor  was  considered  a  most  sound  authority,  and 
was  spoken  of  with  great  respect  in  learned  treatises  and 
theological  conventions.  He  had  not  been  shelved  ;  he 
had  simply  retired  from  the  professorship,  that  he  might 
have  unlimited  leisure  to  shed  ink  upon  his  great  theme, 
which  looked  as  beautiful  to  his  eyes  as  the  principles  of 
perspective  to  that  old  Italian  painter  who  would  stand 
musing  for  hours,  and  then  exclaim,  "  How  beautiful  is 
perspective  !  "  So  when  they  all  moved  to  the  old  Myers 
place  that  spring,  the  question  at  once  arose  among  the 
girls  as  to  where  papa  would  have  his  study.  The  house, 
with  its  quaint  gables  and  outside  chimneys,  looked  large 


174  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

on  the  exteiror,  but  within  it  was  badly  cut  up  into  little 
odd  rooms,  opening  upon  blind  passages.  Steps  led  up 
here  and  down  there,  and  bedrooms  communicated  with 
each  other  like  a  nest  of  boxes.  The  windows  were  put 
into  corners  and  placed  too  high,  and  there  was  not  a 
private  nook  for  a  scholar  in  the  whole  house.  The  old 
man  went  dreamily  over  the  house  with  his  girls,  living 
over  again  in  some  dim  way  the  hours  he  had  spent  there 
in  his  youth  when  he,  too,  was  a  lover.  But  it  all  seemed 
very  vague  and  shadowy.  There  were  only  two  rooms  in 
the  badly  contrived  place  that  were  at  all  adapted  to  his 
needs,  and  these  the  girls  had  previously  appropriated  for 
spare  chambers.  For  of  course  they  must  have  some 
place  to  stow  away  Frank,  and  Harold,  and  Paul,  and 
Edward  when  they  came.  And  they  would  always  be 
coming  ;  some  lived  near  and  some  at  a  distance,  but  the 
house  could  count  on  at  least  one  resident  lover  in  per 
petuity. 

The  girls  of  course  could  not  tell  dear  papa  there  was 
no  place  for  his  study,  but  he  understood  it  well  enough, 
and  yielded  tacitly  in  his  own  gentle,  uncomplaining  way. 
He  wandered  out  in  the  garden  under  the  tall  trees,  where 
he  had  walked  with  his  young  bride  so  many  years  ago  ; 
it  seemed  all  to  have  happened  in  a  pre-existent  state,  and 
he  tried  to  recall  those  vivid  emotions  and  the  flush  of 
happiness  when  the  birds  sang  in  Paradise.  Then  he 
stepped  on  into  the  barn.  It  was  a  clean,  water-tight, 
sweet-smelling  barn,  with  that  homely  cheer  and  pleasant 
ness  that  belongs  to  such  places.  It  was  empty,  swept 
and  garnished.  The  professor  felt  himself  too  poor  to 
keep  a  horse,  and  the  barn  was  practically  useless.  He 
climbed  up  a  ladder  into  the  mow,  and  looked  out  of  a 
high  window.  The  view  was  glorious  over  Saddleback, 
the  intervale,  and  the  winding  river,  all  dressed  in  the 
living  green  of  May.  His  dim  eyes,  accustomed  to  the 
close  quarters  of  an  ugly  paved  town,  devoid  of  scenery, 


THE  BARV   STUDY.  I?5 

beheld  this  lovely  prospect  as  something  new  and  sur 
prising.  It  was  a  revelation  of  the  beauty  of  the  world, 
and  seemed  to  blend  with  those  vague  visions  of  his 
old  self,  of  the  time  when  he  was  not  a  professor^ 
absorbed  in  the  freedom  of  the  will,  but  a  young  man 
pleading  ardently  for  a  fair  girl's  love.  He  determined 
then  and  there  to  build  a  study  for  himself  in  the  vacant 
barn.  A  roughly  plastered  room,  warm  and  light,  was 
all  he  wanted.  Here  he  could  insure  perfect  quiet  in 
which  to  pursue  his  great  theme.  So  the  room  was 
built,  and  all  the  professor's  books  and  papers  were 
carried  in,  as  well  as  his  desk  and  study  chair.  He  was 
furnished  with  a  student  lamp  for  night  work,  and  Lois 
laid  down  a  carpet  and  rugs,  and  hung  some  old  prints 
on  the  wall.  The  window  stook  in  that  exquisite  mount 
ain  and  valley  and  river  view  in  the  first  flush  of  spring, 
and  the  old  man  felt  as  if  scales  had  fallen  from  his  eyes 
as  he  sat  watching  the  changes  of  the  landscape — the 
play  of  light  and  shadow  over  the  sky,  storms  gathering 
and  moving  off  the  mountain,  bursts  of  sunlight  on  dis 
tant  fields  and  woods,  the  dart  of  lightning,  and  the  flush 
of  sunrise  upon  the  hills.  For  a  quarter  of  a  century  he 
had  been  immured  in  brick  and  stone,  and  there  had 
written  a  great  deal  about  God's  universe.  Now  the 
universe  was  before  him,  and  new  aspects  of  the  great 
free-will  problem  presented  themselves  to  his  mind.  He 
felt  himself  in  primitive  and  child-like  relation  to  God, 
and  a  fresh,  original  scheme  of  doctrine  and  argument 
warmed  his  heart  and  animated  his  intellect.  When  he 
wrote  now  it  was  with  a  kind  of  inspiration  that  surprised 
and  delighted  him.  He  became  reverent  and  religious 
in  a  new  and  unexpected  way. 

Of  course,  no  one  knew  of  the  wonderful  hours  the 
professor  was  spending  in  his  barn  study.  He  was  reti 
cent  of  all  that  went  on  within  him,  and  his  own  girls 
were  as  ignorant  as  his  neighbors.  One  of  the  windows 


1 76  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

of  his  study  commanded  a  corner  of  the  old  garden,  just 
a  little  hidden  nook  with  a  green  bench  set  in  the  shade. 
Here  one  or  other  of  the  engaged  couples  came  sometimes 
for  a  quiet  talk,  and  the  old  professor  would  have  felt 
guilty  in  watching  them  if  they  had  not  seemed  to  him 
so  like  a  picture  or  a  vision — a  help  in  that  odd  psy 
chological  process  by  which  he  was  getting  back  his  lost 
youth  and  revivifying  his  heart  and  brain.  The  neigh 
bors  pitied  him  because  his  large  family  of  giddy  girls 
had  pushed  him  out  into  the  cold.  A  few  spinsters  and 
widows  who  were  looking  for  husbands  tried  to  let  him 
know  how  well  prepared  they  were  to  sympathize  with  a 
lonely  gentleman  unappreciated  by  his  own  daughters, 
and  obliged  to  live  with  the  bats  and  owls.  But  it  was 
all  lost  on  him.  He  was  too  happy  to  think  of  changing 
his  state.  He  spent  more  and  more  of  his  time  in  the 
repose  and  solitude  of  his  new  study,  and  when  he  failed 
to  come  to  his  meals  they  were  carried  out  to  him  by  one 
of  his  girls,  who,  it  must  be  confessed,  saw  but  little  of 
their  father  at  any  other  time. 

The  summer  holidays  had  come,  and  the  lovers  were  all 
there.  The  windows  were  wide  open,  and  roses  and 
honeysuckles  bloomed  around  the  old  porches,  and  the 
trees  threw  thick,  cool  shadows.  Every  corner  of  the 
yard  and  garden  was  consecrated  to  love  and  romance, 
and  the  house,  too,  was  appropriated  in  every  part  by 
these  happy  young  people.  If  the  professor  entered  un 
expectedly,  he  was  apt  to  find  Frank  and  Jane  installed 
in  the  parlor,  Harold  and  Hatty  in  the  library,  while  Lily 
and  Ned  pervaded  the  reception-room  and  Grace  and 
Paul  held  possession  of  the  veranda.  There  hardly 
seemed  a  place  inside  the  house  where  he  could  sit  down 
without  intruding  on  lovers'  rights,  so  he  fell  into  the 
habit  of  asking  his  friends  to  come  and  see  him  in  the 
barn.  His  old  clerical  companions  and  fellow-professors 
were  always  asked  out  there  to  see  the  view  when 


AN  INDIAN  SUMMER  POEM.  177 

they  called.  The  professor,  in  his  simple-mindedness, 
thought  nothing  of  it.  The  repose  and  quiet  of  the 
barn  had  been  so  much  in  his  spiritual  experience,  of 
course  it  must  be  pleasant  to  his  friends. 

The  villagers  made  jokes  about  the  professor's  hobby 
on  the  freedom  of  the  will,  he  who  had  no  freedom  in 
his  own  house,  and  had  been  driven  out  by  a  pack  of 
selfish  girls  to  seek  refuge  in  a  stable.  Poor  Lois  heard 
it  all,  but  so  long  as  papa  seemed  happy  and  contented 
she  would  not  let  the  gossip  come  to  his  ears.  Her  sis 
ters  would  all  be  married  in  a  few  months,  and  then  she 
would  devote  her  life  to  making  papa  comfortable. 
Meantime  the  professor  was  writing  a  book  that  was 
destined  to  be  very  popular  among  all  classes  of  relig 
ious  people,  though  he  did  not  know  it.  It  was  an 
Indian-summer  poem,  called  out  by  the  aspiration  and 
the  new  life  he  had  found  in  the  summer  solitude.  His 
cramped  thoughts  expanded  and  became  winged  and 
caught  the  motion  of  the  swallows  as  they  skimmed 
round  his  windows.  His  mind,  he  felt,  had  always  been 
in  a  straight-jacket,  and  now  he  was  free,  and  the  ideas 
came  like  spring  torrents.  So  the  days  went  on,  those 
idyllic  barn  days,  when  the  old  man's  one  popular  book 
was  getting  written — all  the  dry  arguments  transfusing 
themselves  with  a  glow  of  new  life — when  one  morning 
Grace,  his  youngest  daughter,  came  into  the  study. 

"  Well,  what  is  it,  my  dear  ?  "  putting  out  his  fatherly 
hand,  without  looking  at  her,  as  his  head  remained  bent 
over  the  writing-table.  "  Papa,  I  want  to  speak  to  you 
if  you  do  not  mind."  "  Of  course,  my  dear,  I  am  always 
ready  to  attend  to  you."  He  turned  about  at  once,  and 
she  perched  herself  on  his  knee,  looking  like  a  depressed 
canary  bird  with  its  feathers  a  little  rumpled  by  mental 
agitation.  There  were  two  or  three  diamond  drops 
twinkling  on  the  long  lashes  of  her  gray  eyes. 

"  Well,   my  dear  ;    well,  what  is  it  ? "   and  the  hand 


I?8  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

kept  on  smoothing  her  hair  half-abstractedly.  "  Oh, 
papa,"  and  her  head  suddenly  buried  itself  on  his 
shoulder.  "  I  have  qua-a-r-reled  with  Paul.  He  is  go 
ing  away." 

"  Quarreled  with  Paul  ?  " 

"  Yes,  papa,"  she  sobbed,  "  and  about  you.  You 
know  he  was  in  your  classes  in  the  seminary,  and  he  al 
ways  looked  up  to  you  ;  and  now  he  says  we  girls  don't 
treat  you  with  respect — our  own  dear  father.  We  don't 
honor  you  as  we  should,  and  the  village  people  know  it. 
We  have  thrust  you  out  in  the  barn  ;  we  neglect  you 
shamefully,  and  you  such  a  great,  and  learned,  and  dis 
tinguished  man." 

The  professor  drew  his  little  weeping  girl  closer  in  the 
bend  of  his  arm,  and  tried  to  soothe  her  as  best  he 
could.  "  My  child,  how  your  heart  beats  !  You  are  ill. 
•I  have  been  engrossed  with  my  own  thoughts.  I  have 
neglected  you,  and  it  is  all  my  fault.  You  must  go  and 
send  Paul  to  me." 

Well,  Paul  went  to  his  old  professor  and  had  a  long 
talk  with  him,  and  of  course  it  was  all  made  up  with 
Grace.  But  the  old  man  would  not  leave  his  barn  study. 
In  the  autumn  the  four  sisters  were  married,  and  the 
beauty  and  charm  of  those  weddings  are  still  talked  of 
in  the  village  as  something  to  date  from.  But  the  old 
Myers  place  looked  deserted  after  the  lovely  quartette  of 
sisters  had  departed.  The  professor  came  back  to  the 
house  to  live  with  his  good  home-staying  Lois.  But  the 
wonderful  inspiration  of  the  summer  never  returned, 
though  he  tried  to  woo  it.  It  was  his  brief  Indian- 
summer,  and  it  left  him  broken  and  old.  His  book  made 
a  noise  in  the  world,  and  brought  him  the  pleasure  of  an 
afternoon  success,  but  the  rare  mood  which  produced  it 
was  gone  forever.  One  day,  with  a  gentle,  placid  smile 
on  his  worn  face,  the  old  man  was  found  lying  dead 
on  his  couch,  where  he  was  taking  his  midday  rest. 


CHAPTER  XX. 

THE    COLORED    BROWNS. 

WE  have  only  one  family  of  colored  people  in  the  vil 
lage,  and  we  are  rather  proud  of  the  possession. 
It  was  by  a  mere  accident  that  Mandy  and  Sambo  Brown 
came  to  live  with  us.  They  were  both  born  into  slavery, 
and  were  taken  by  their  parents  to  Canada  by  means  of 
the  underground  railroad.  Having  grown  up  in  the  bleak 
North,  they  met  and  married  in  the  Queen's  dominions, 
and  started  back  toward  the  old  home  a  few  years  after 
the  close  of  the  war.  They  stopped  one  day  at  our  vil 
lage  with  the  thought  of  resting  for  a  time,  but  as  they 
were  made  welcome  by  Aunt  Dido,  the  great  friend  of  their 
race,  and  work  was  procured  for  them,  and  a  place  to 
live,  they  finally  settled  down  into  citizens  of  the  town, 
and  have  become  by  their  sobriety  and  industry  as  much 
respected  as  "white  folks,"  and  more  than  some.  As 
Aunt  Dido  was  the  first  to  take  the  Browns  under  her 
wing,  she  has  always  been  rather  proud  of  them  as  speci- 
imens  of  "likely"  black  people,  prophecies  and  hints  of 
what  the  race  may  become  with  proper  culture  and  fav 
oring  circumstances. 

But  the  merits  of  Black  Sambo  and  Mandy  shine  brighter 
than  they  probably  would  in  a  community  where  negroes 
abound.  Here  they  shine  alone — black  diamonds,  among 
the  contrasting  jewels  of  the  village.  Sam,  with  the 
peculiar  genius  of  his  people  for  jobbing,  gets  plenty  of 
work  to  do,  but  it  is  not  what  may  be  called  regular, 
steady  employment.  He  makes  gardens  for  the  single 
women  and  widows,  helps  in  house-cleaning,  whitewashes, 
paints,  and  "paper-hangs"  a  little,  runs  errands,  chops 


l8o  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

wood,  doctors  sick  dogs,  and  "  teams  it  "  to  the  next 
town.  He  knows,  too,  a  little  plumbing  and  carpenter 
ing,  and  can  tinker  at  several  trades.  There  is  always 
something  to  keep  Sam  going  ;  and  he  is  so  faithful, 
pleasant,  and  happy-tempered  that  people  like  to  have 
him  around. 

Sam  is  up  with  the  dawn  in  spring,  and  you  will  hear 
him  singing  snatches  of  old  plantation  song,  as  he  digs 
and  hoes  in  his  little  garden.  That  garden  is  the  pride 
of  his  life.  The  dew  is  sweet  as  it  falls  into  his  beds  and 
nourishes  the  tomato  plants  and  the  succulent  sweet 
corn.  Sambo  has  what  many  a  poor  man  might  have  by 
taking  a  little  pains,  a  bed  of  asparagus  and  a  patch  of 
fine  strawberries.  He  grows  a  little  okra  to  give  the 
children  a  taste  of  it  in  their  broth,  and  is  careful  to  put 
in  plenty  of  crookneck  squashes,  cucumbers  and  melons. 
He  kills  the  potato  bugs  and  roots  out  the  vermin,  and 
waters  his  plants  in  a  dry  time,  so  that,  whether  the  sea 
son  be  wet  or  droughty,  warm  or  cold,  Sam  Brown's 
garden  is  a  beautiful  example  to  his  poor  neighbors. 

There  were  but  two  children  in  the  Brown  family  when 
they  came  to  the  village  some  years  ago  ;  now  there  are 
five  of  them,  pretty,  bright-eyed  and  neat.  You  would 
not  ask  for  a  kink  the  less  in  their  frizzled  black  heads. 
But  Mandy  Brown  is  of  an  entirely  different  temper  from 
Sam.  There  is  but  little  of  the  happy-go-lucky  about 
her.  She  seldom  sings  the  old  plantation  and  camp- 
meeting  songs  Sam  is  always  whistling.  The  iron  of 
slavery  seems  to  have  entered  into  Mandy's  soul  when 
she  was  very  young,  intensified  by  her  experience  of  the 
cold  Canada  winters,  and  the  hardships  of  exile  she  ex 
perienced  when  her  mother  died  from  privation.  But 
Mandy  has  a  far  better  intellect  than  Sam.  She  is  the 
elect  head  of  the  family,  keeps  all  the  money  they  jointly 
earn,  buys  all  the  supplies,  plans  every  thing,  and  gives 
Sambo  just  so  much  change  to  spend  each  week  for  fish- 


MANDY'S    WORK-ROOM.  181 

hooks  and  tobacco.  She  is  a  high-class  laundress,  and 
is  regularly  employed  by  three  or  four  families  in  the 
village,  who  know  what  nice  work  is  and  are  willing  to 
pay  a  good  price  for  it.  Mrs.  Judge  Magnus  employs 
Mandy  to  do  up  all  her  fine  bed  and  table  linen,  her 
damask  of  the  best,  her  lace-trimmed  and  embroidered 
pillow-shams,  also  her  own  dainty  gowns  and  dressing- 
sacks  and  petticoats,  frilled  and  fluted  to  perfection. 
You  should  see  these  beautiful  things  drifted  like  snow 
banks  into  Mandy's  exquisitely  neat  sitting-room  where 
she  irons.  The  clothes  smell  as  fragrant  as  a  field  of 
clover  or  sweet  grass,  and  shine  with  the  gloss  of  a 
strong  elbow,  and  on  the  window-sill  stands  a  mug  or 
pitcher  full  of  flowers  the  children  have  brought  in.  It 
is  a  picture  to  see  the  black  face  at  the  spotless  ironing- 
table  bending  over  the  snowy  linen,  while  the  deft  hands 
crimp,  and  flute,  and  shape,  with  a  real  love  for  the  work. 
You  would  know  a  good  deal  about  Mandy  by  looking 
at  her  clothes  when  they  lie  heaped  in  the  great  basket, 
or  are  hung  for  the  last  drying  on  the  horse.  She  is  tall, 
and  trim,  and  neat,  in  her  dark  calico  gown,  with  a  grace 
ful  turn  of  the  waist  and  shoulders  not  uncommon  to  her 
race.  Mandy  never  wears  bright  kerchiefs  or  head-gear, 
but  she  shows  her  tropical  nature  in  her  love  of  red  pop 
pies  and  scarlet  geraniums  and  vivid  salvias,  which  she 
cultivates  by  the  door  of  her  little  house. 

The  house  stands  on  the  edge  of  a  small  field  and 
garden,  with  a  few  pear  and  plum  trees  at  one  corner, 
and  all  the  bright  flowers  Mandy  can  crowd  into  the 
narrow  space  between  the  door-step  and  the  front  gate. 
A  tiny  stable  made  of  slabs  and  cast-off  boards  shelters 
the  cow  in  winter.  Chicks,  and  hens,  and  kittens  run 
about  at  will  in  the  grass,  and  a  lean-to  shed  with  a  rope 
swing  makes  an  outdoor  nursery  for  the  children.  Sam 
and  Mandy  own  this  snug  little  place.  They  have  been 
able  to  pay  for  it  in  small  installments,  and  there  are  no 


1 82  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

people  in  the  town  more  independent,  and,  I  may  say, 
more  self-respecting. 

But  Mandy,  in  spite  of  her  love  for  the  scarlet  flowers, 
still  has  something  of  the  Puritan  sternness  of  temper. 
The  old  sense  of  wrong  rankles  at  times  in  her  soul. 
Her  conscience  is  uneasy  and  inclined  to  be  morbid. 
She  goes  over  and  over  the  old  slave  days  and  her  early 
sufferings,  and  dwells  upon  them — contrasts  them  with 
these  piping  times  of  peace  and  prosperity.  She  reads 
the  old  Bible — for  she  can  read  and  write,  too — with  all 
its  ancient  curses,  and  wonders  in  her  soul  whether  she 
and  Sam  and  the  children  are  vessels  of  wrath  too  worth 
less  and  unfit  for  salvation.  She  feels  her  own  heart  to 
be  rather  hard  and  cold,  when  there  is  no  living  being 
who  ought  to  be  more  tender  and  thankful.  She  teases 
herself  with  the  idea  that  as  a  family  they  are  not  as 
grateful  as  they  should  be  for  the  mercies  of  the  Lord, 
that  perhaps  some  day  they  may  be  punished  because 
they  don't  have  enough  thankfulness  in  their  souls.  She 
can  not  enjoy  with  careless  light-heartedness,  like  Sambo, 
the  goods  the  gods  provide,  but  must  be  digging  up  her 
blessings  to  see  how  they  grow  before  she  has  tasted  the 
sweets  thereof. 

It  must  be  confessed,  Mandy,  with  all  her  good  quali 
ties,  is  at  times  rather  saturnine  and  ill-tempered,  with 
something  of  the  old  African  seeress  in  her  blood.  Sam^ 
so  easy-going  and  sunny,  attributes  her  bad  temper  to  the 
fact  that  she  is  "  powerful  smart."  All  smart  folks,  in 
Sam's  estimation,  are  high-strung,  quick,  and  touchy.  It 
is  a  penalty  that  smartness  pays  for  the  privileges  it 
enjoys  ;  therefore  Sambo  reveres  even  his  wife's  temper 
and  looks  up  to  her  as  a  superior  being.  The  children 
are  all  like  Sam,  easy-going,  careless,  light-hearted  little 
types  of  their  own  race.  Sam  secretly  regrets  that 
Mandy's  high  qualities  have  not  been  transmitted  to 
some  of  the  "  pickaninnies."  He  says,  "  They're  peart 


SAMBO   AND   THE    "  PICKAX1XXIES."  183 

enough,  the  Lord  knows,  but  not  so  peart  as  Mandy,  fo' 
sho."  Mandy  keeps  them  as  neat  as  wax  and  they  go  to 
school  and  sit  on  benches  with  the  white  children,  and 
study  out  of  the  same  books.  But  the  rollicking  nature 
of  the  Southron  gleams  out  of  their  bright  black  eyes, 
white  teeth,  ebon  faces,  and  knotty  curls.  Even  the 
little  dances  and  plays  they  improvise  together  all  carry 
Mandy  back  to  the  old  hated  plantation  days,  and  she 
sees  them  with  pain.  She  wishes  her  children  to  get 
"  shet"  of  all  that,  to  be  like  northern  folks — good  little 
Sunday-school  children,  learning  their  text-cards  and 
minding  just  "  beautiful." 

But  Sam  delights  in  the  children  just  as  they  are.  He 
"totes"  the  little  ones  when  they  "  play  'possum,"  and 
pretend  they  can't  walk,  until  his  back  aches.  The 
moment  he  comes  home  they  are  swarming  all  over  him — 
taking  liberties  with  his  pockets,  climbing  up  on  his 
shoulders,  and  begging  for  stories.  So  Sambo  "  nurses" 
the  children,  gathering  as  many  of  them  as  he  can  into 
his  arms,  while  the  others  hang  on  anyhow,  and  tells  them 
interminable  yarns  while  he  smokes  his  pipe.  Sambo 
always  goes  back  "  Souf  "  for  those  marvelous  tales,  and 
shows  the  little  ones  in  his  rude,  figurative  speech,  between 
pulls  at  the  pipe,  the  cane-brake,  and  the  cotton-patch, 
and  the  solemn  pine  forest  and  cypress  swamps,  and 
the  great  red  oaks  clad  in  long  gray  moss.  He  shows 
them  "  ole  mas'r"  and  "  little  mas'r  and  miss"  riding  on 
their  ponies  or  in  the  "  kerridge."  He  shows  them  the 
fine  old  plantation-house,  and  the  negro-quarter  as  he 
remembers  it  before  the  "  wah,"  and  describes  the  banjo 
playing,  the  dances  and  songs  and  break-downs,  the 
revivals  and  love  feasts,  and  how  the  darkies  pray  and 
shout.  He  shows  them  the  strange  flowers,  the  magnolia, 
and  jasmine,  and  myrtle  tree,  the  creepers  and  wonderful 
blossoms  hidden  in  "  de  swamp,"  which  he  knew  in  his 
boyhood,  and  the  fascinating  serpents  and  wild  animals, 


184  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

alligators,  catamounts,  'coons,  and  'possums.  He  imi 
tates  the  call  of  the  mocking-bird  in  a  long,  low  whistle 
until  the  kinky  hair  kinks  a  little  tighter,  and  the  eyes 
roll  up  and  show  the  whites,  and  the  absorbed  look  is 
most  charming  in  that  dusky  group  of  little  ones,  who 
have  never  seen  the  wonderful,  fascinating  "  Souf,"  with 
all  its  mirthfulness  and  wealth  of  color. 

Sambo  never  threw  any  dark  shades  into  his  pictures. 
Mandy,  when  she  caught  snatches  of  his  stories  as  she 
went  to  and  fro  about  her  work,  wondered  if  he  had  for 
gotten  all  the  oppression  and  wrong  of  the  old  slave 
days,  and  remembered  only  those  sunny  pictures,  that 
careless  life  of  dance  and  song  when  the  long  day's  work 
was  done.  It  must  be  confessed  Mandy  had  a  kind  of 
contempt  for  light-hearted  Sambo,  who  had  endured  so 
much  unscathed  in  soul,  and  now  felt  no  touch  of  bitter 
ness,  rebellion,  or  revenge  for  the  past.  Perhaps  now  in 
these  blessed  days  of  freedom  he  hardly  remembered 
there  had  been  any  wrong. 

The  children  did  not  love  her  as  they  loved  the  father. 
Her  high  temper  brought  a  word  and  a  blow.  She  often 
instructed  them  about  old  slave  times,  showing  how  they 
had  no  sense  of  gratitude  for  what  they  enjoyed,  only  a 
powerful  all-dominating  love  of  play  and  mischief.  They 
were  idle  ne'er-do-wells,  unworthy  of  the  liberty  so  dearly 
bought.  It  almost  seemed  a  grievance  that  her  children 
had  not  known  the  sufferings  of  the  old  life,  the  escape 
from  bondage,  the  underground  railroad,  the  Arctic  exile 
in  Canada.  It  was  at  such  moments,  when  administer 
ing  correction  for  little  trespasses  and  idle  ways,  errands 
left  undone,  and  lessons  shirked,  that  Mandy  recounted 
these  things. 

"  Yo'se  no  account,  you  is  (cuff).  Yo'  don't  know  nof- 
fin'  'bout  what  it  is  to  be  a  slave,  to  have  some  bad  man 
crack  de  whip  over  you  and  make  you  work  when  yo'  is 
fallin'  in  your  tracks  (slap).  Yo'  never  tinks  of  de  bless- 


MANDT  S  LECTURE.  185 

in's  of  born  freedom,  nor  what  y'r  moder  endured  in  de 
ole  days.  Yo'se  dat  no  account,  you  'fuses  to  learn  your 
lesson  when  your  moder  had  no  schoolin' — wasn't  let  to 
learn  any  t'ing — was  kep'  in  ignerance  (slap),  had  to  steal 
away  in  de  night  time  to  get  a  little  instruction  in  de 
Bible  and  de  hymn-book.  Yo'se  don't  care  much  'bout 
de  word  ob  God,  nor  de  wraf  of  God,  nor  how  de  bars 
come  and  eat  up  de  bad  children  as  mocked.  Yo'se  don't 
want  to  learn  about  Abram,  and  Isaac,  and  Jacob,  dem 
just  men,  and  de  land  ob  promise,  and  all  dem  pious 
t'ings.  You'se  no  account — dont  know  what  it  means  to 
be  livin'  in  a  land  of  liberty — don't  know  nothing  'tall 
about  de  oppression  of  ole  slave  times,  don't  care  to  hear 
'bout  dem  t'ings,  when  yo'se  fader  tells  ob  de  cake-walks 
and  de  break-downs  on  de  Miss'ippi.  I'se  ashamed  of 
my  chilluns  as  don't  '  preciate  der  blessings,  and  ain't 
t'ankin  de  Lord  every  bref  dey  draw  for  bein'  free." 
(Here  a  sharp  series  of  slaps.) 

"Yo'se  just  spilin'  dem  pickaninnies,"  Mandy  would 
say  to  Sambo,  "  teachin'  of  'em  to  be  plantation  darkies 
'stead  of  'merican  citizens  as  read  de  newspapers,  and 
votes  to  shut  up  de  rum  shops,  and  goes  to  meetin'  Sun 
day  neat  and  respectable.  You  is  puttin'  all  kinds  of 
fool  notions  in  dere  heads,  and  settin'  'em  ag'in'  me." 

Sambo  laughed  in  his  easy  way  at  the  notion  of  setting 
the  children  against  their  mother,  who  was  probably  the 
"  peartest  "  woman  that  ever  lived,  while  he  was  only  an 
or'nary  darky,  without  any  thing  specially  bright  about 
him.  But  still  the  fact  remained  that  the  children  loved 
him  best,  and  liked  better  to  be  with  him  and  listen  to 
his  desultory  talk,  given  forth  with  unctuous,  easy  voice, 
than  to  hang  about  their  mother  at  the  risk  of  getting 
their  ears  boxed  for  every  little  misdemeanor.  It  was 
also  true  that  Mandy  knew  while  she  sat  up  nights  to 
make  them  nice  clothes,  and  denied  herself  much  that 
they  might  go  as  well  dressed  as  the  children  of  her 


1 86  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

white  neighbors,  they  loved  their  father  best,  and  was 
jealous  of  his  influence. 

Sambo  had  put  up  a  swing  for  the  children  out  near 
the  shed,  and  there  they  built  their  play-houses  and  held 
their  little  revels.  One  day  Mandy  heard  a  great  groan 
ing  and  shouting  out  in  the  shed  where  the  children  were 
at  play.  So  she  slipped  unobserved  into  the  stable,  and 
peeped  through  a  crack  in  the  board  wall  to  see  what  was 
going  on.  Most  of  the  children  were  holding  a  "  'speri- 
ence  meeting  "  such  as  their  father  had  often  described. 
They  were  down  on  their  knees  in  the  straw,  clasping 
their  stomachs,  and  waving  back  and  forth  in  great  dis 
tress  of  mind  as  they  groaned  over  their  sins.  Now  and 
then  they  broke  out  into  snatches  of  negro  hymns,  or  fell 
down  in  the  straw  with  the  "  power."  When  seemingly 
quite  stiff  and  stark,  one  would  cry  out,  "  I'se  dead  fo' 
sho',"  and  another  would  answer,  "I'se  deader,"  and 
then  they  would  leap  to  their  feet  with  shouts  of  laugh 
ter,  and  begin  a  plantation  clog  dance  or  a  cake-walk. 
They  had  improvised  a  banjo  with  some  string  wound 
over  a  wooden  box.  The  banjo  accompaniment  was  given 
with  all  the  dances,  and  even  with  the  prayers  and  hymns. 

One  little  girl  sat  nursing  her  colored  rag-baby  in  a 
corner  of  the  shed,  where  a  log  table  was  set  out  with 
bits  of  broken  crockery.  She  wished  the  child,  who  was 
afflicted  with  rag-baby  colic,  to  take  paregoric  peaceably 
out  of  a  teaspoon,  and  without  any  resistance  to  mater 
nal  authority.  But  as  the  infant  was  rebellious,  she  gave 
it  several  sharp  cuffs  and  shakes,  thus  apostrophizing  it 
while  the  process  went  on  :  "  You'se  a  low-down  no-ac 
count  little  nig.  I'se  ashamed  of  you  in  dis  land  of 
liberty  ;  you  don't  sense  what  it  is  to  be  free  and  to 
enjoy  de  pribliges  ob  schoolin'  and  churches.  Yo'se  dat 
worthless  yo'  o'ut  to  be  a  slabe  all  yo'se  bo'n  days,"  and 
then  after  another  quick  series  of  slaps  she  threw  the 
luckless  infant  down  into  the  straw,  and  gave  it  a  hearty 
kick.  "  Let's  all  be  slaves,"  cried  the  children  simul- 


SELF- RE  VELA  TION.  1 8  7 

taneously,  and  then  they  tied  their  hands  and  feet  loosely 
together  with  string,  and  went  hobbling  around  the  shed 
singing  an  improvised  ditty  suitable  to  the  occasion  : 

"  I'se  gwine  to  ole  mas'r, 
I'se  gwine  to  de  Souf, 

Glory,  glory,  hallelujum, 
I's  gwine  to  ole  Virginny, 
'Cos  I'se  a  pickaninny, 

Glory,  glory,  hallelujum. 

"  I'se  gwine  to  ole  mas'r, 
To  dance  in  de  cane-brake, 

Glory,  glory,  hallelujum, 
I'se  gwine  to  ole  mas'r, 
A  walkin'  for  de  cake, 

Glory,  glory,  hallelujum." 

Mandy  stole  back  to  her  bright,  clean  kitchen,  and  for 
the  rest  of  the  day  she  was  very  quiet  and  thoughtful. 
She  had  seen  a  picture  of  herself,  and  such  self-revelation 
is  always  profoundly  instructive.  She  was  suffering  from 
that  reaction  in  her  children  which  accompanies  the 
violent,  harsh  teaching  of  all  good  doctrine.  She  had 
tried  by  blows  and  strong  language  and  sarcastic  appeals 
to  make  them  devotees  of  liberty  and  above  all  things 
"  'spectable,"  and  now,  God  help  them,  they  were  sighing 
for  the  flesh-pots  of  the  Egyptians — "  ole  mas'r  and  de 
Souf,"  that  land  of  easy  jollity  and  careless  pleasure. 

When  Sambo  came  home  he  found  Mandy  quite  meek 
and  subdued,  dressed  in  a  new  blue  gingham,  with  a 
spotless  white  necktie.  He  thought  he  had  never  seen 
her  so  nice  or  so  kind.  That  night  when  the  children  were 
all  in  bed  and  she  sat  patching  little  Jim's  breeches  by 
the  lamp,  she  even  allowed  Sam  to  smoke  in  the  sitting- 
room,  a  privilege  not  often  accorded.  She  had  been 
snipping  away  with  her  shears  a  long  time  in  silence,  com 
muning  with  her  own  thoughts,  when  she  broke  forth  : 

"  Sam,  I'se  goin'  to  try  and  be  a  Christian  after  this.  I 
reckon  I'se  been  a  big  heathen  all  my  life." 

"  Dat's  the  one  t'ing  needful  for  us  all,  I  reckon, 
Mandy,"  said  Sam,  as  he  shook  the  ashes  from  his  pipe. 


CHAPTER  XXI. 

THE  MINISTER'S  GLEBE  AND  HOPE'S  LOVE  STORY. 

I  REMEMBER  with  the  greatest  pleasure  some  walks 
through  the  "  minister's  glebe "  on  the  old  post- 
road,  about  a  mile  and  a  half  from  the  village.  The  path 
winds  through  the  farm  and  home  fields,  to  the  stone  par 
sonage  or  manse,  which  has  long  been  disused  as  a  par 
ish  house,  and  is  now  turned  into  a  boys'  school.  The 
land  is  a  high  plateau  framed  in  blue  hills,  with  vistas  of 
valley  and  river  gleaming  through  chance  gaps  in  the 
woodland.*  On  such  land  one  has  almost  the  same  sense 
of  being  launched  off  in  the  sky  as  on  a  mountain-top. 
Clouds  assume  the  grandest  forms  in  such  open  spaces, 
and  the  chasing  effects  of  light  and  shade  bring  back 
those  inimitable  Flemish  landscapes  where  the  nimble 
play  of  the  sun  fills  the  mind  with  that  sense  of  expan 
sion  which  I  can  imagine  is  the  first  and  most  immediate 
effect  of  death. 

The  little  twisted  path  through  the  glebe  takes  you 
close  beside  fields  of  wheat,  oats,  and  rye,  and  other 
growing  crops,  and  through  the  grass  and  clover  fields, 
which  are  now  lusty  and  of  splendid  promise.  The  sheen 
of  those  young,  glossy  crops  bending  under  the  morning 
wind,  and  spotted  with  sunlight,  is  not  soon  to  be  for 
gotten.  What  wonder  the  bobolink  loves  these  places 
with  all  his  passionate  little  heart,  and  pours  out  a  series 
of  trills  that  seem  to  run  all  round  the  still  leafy  world, 
mounting  at  last  into  the  very  sky  ? 

The  oldest  people  of  the  village  remember  the  Rev. 
Dr.  Abijah  Manners,  the  last  of  our  old  Puritan  minis 
ters  of  a  former  generation,  who  lived  on  the  minister's 


DR.    ABIJAH  PRAYS  FOR  RAIN.  189 

glebe  and  occupied  the  old  manse,  and  they  talk  of  him 
still  almost  as  if  he  were  alive  and  moving  about  among 
us.  The  old  clergyman  was  such  an  upright,  down 
right,  positive  man,  he  made  an  indelible  impression  on 
his  generation,  and  even  the  children  fancy  they  have 
seen  the  swing  of  his  strong,  active  figure  down  the  vil 
lage  street  as  he  strode  along,  taking  great  steps,  dressed 
in  the  single-breasted  coat  and  shovel  hat  of  his  order. 
He  carried  with  him  everywhere  a  kind  of  paternal 
authority.  Brusque,  quick,  and  active,  the  doctor  was 
not  given  to  long  harangues  on  the  state  of  the  soul,  but 
he  often  spoke  the  word  of  admonition  and  warning 
which  went  directly  to  the  point,  hitting  the  nail  on  the 
head  with  marvelous  accuracy  and  precision.  He  car 
ried  the  same  prompt,  clear  manner  into  his  religious 
ministrations.  He  never  shirked  a  duty,  nor  did  he 
allow  any  of  the  old  dogmas  to  waver  and  grow  weak  in 
his  mind,  thus  invalidating  the  potency  of  his  instruc 
tions.  He  took  his  doctrine  as  straight  as  the  swath  he 
mowed  in  the  nine-acre  lot.  The  edges  were  not  blurred 
by  modern  doubt  or  critical  inquiry.  All  was  clean,  and 
direct,  and  true  in  the  doctor's  mind.  Indeed,  it  was  a 
much  simpler  age  than  ours.  When  he  prayed  for  rain, 
the  people  trusted  implicitly  in  his  power  to  change  the 
laws  of  nature.  All  up  and  down  the  valley  Doctor 
Abijah  was  depended  upon  in  a  dry  time. 

Once  after  a  great  drought  Dr.  Abe,  as  he  was  called 
by  the  profane,  prayed  powerfully  for  the  windows  of 
heaven  to  open,  and  that  night  a  heavy  storm  of  wind 
and  rain  set  in,  which  lasted  three  weeks  and  nearly 
spoiled  the  corn  crop.  The  village  tavern-keeper  of 
those  days,  who  was  inclined  to  Universalism,  called  infi 
delity  by  the  neighbors,  met  the  doctor  one  morning  on 
the  road  driving  his  old  white  nag  in  the  clerical 
"shay." 

"  Don't  you  think  you  overdid  it  just  a  leetle  this  time, 


I9°  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

doctor  ? "  he  asked,  with  the  rain  streaming  down  from 
his  garments. 

"  Manifestly  I  did  so  as  far  as  you  are  concerned,"  re 
turned  the  doctor  testily,  "  for  you  need  fire  more  than 
water." 

Dr.  Abijah  was  an  excellent  theologian,  sound  as  a  nut 
on  all  the  doctrines,  and  he  was  moreover  an  admirable 
farmer.  His  sturdy  figure,  with  the  clerical  hat  laid 
aside,  and  his  big  orthodox  head  cased  in  an  old  straw 
tile,  could  be  seen  taking  the  lead  in  the  haying-field, 
where  he  cut  a  broader  and  cleaner  swath  than  any  of 
his  men,  and  always  led  them  by  several  rods.  It  was 
the  same  in  the  wood-lot  and  the  plowing  and  harvest 
ing  ;  Dr.  Abijah  could  hold  his  own  against  the  best 
farmer  in  the  county,  nor  did  he  think  it  at  all  derogatory 
to  his  cloth  to  be  seen  thus  mixing  spiritual  and  tem 
poral  interests.  The  earth  is  the.  Lord's  and  the  full 
ness  thereof,  and  the  doctor  thought  it  perfectly  right 
that  he  should  have  a  good  portion  of  that  fullness 
stowed  away  in  his  barns  and  stacks.  His  energies 
demanded  something  more  than  a  little  sermon-writ 
ing  each  week,  and  it  was  often  remarked  that  the 
harder  he  worked  on  the  six  days  the  more  powerful 
he  was  in  prayer  and  exhortation  on  the  seventh. 

To  be  sure,  when  the  weather  was  very  "ketching,"  as 
it  often  is  in  these  hills,  the  doctor  had  been  known  to 
wander  a  little  in  his  discourse  as  his  thoughts  strayed  off 
to  his  exposed  crop.  He  had  even  on  occasion  rushed 
directly  from  the  pulpit  to  the  haying-field  without 
changing  his  coat,  hurrying  his  men  to  get  out  the 
wagons,  and  with  his  own  strong  arm  pitching  great 
cocks  upon  the  mountainous  load,  while  the  heavens 
grew  black  and  the  thunder  growled  overhead.  With  all 
his  strenuous  orthodoxy  he  was  a  firm  believer  in  the 
truth  of  the  words  of  Jesus,  that  the  Sabbath  was  made 
for  man.  Indeed,  all  practical  farmers,  whether  priests 


USE  AND  ABUSE   OF   TPIE   "CREATURE."      IQ1 

or  laymen,  are  obliged  to  accept  in  their  most  literal 
interpretation  the  words  of  the  Master.  If  any  of  the 
old  women  of  the  congregation,  whose  duty  it  is  to  watch 
the  pastor,  complained  of  this  laxity  of  practice  in  keep 
ing  the  Lord's  Day,  the  doctor  quoted  the  parable  of  the 
sheep  fallen  into  the  pit,  and  drew  the  conclusion  that  a 
field  of  good  grass  is  as  well  worth  saving  as  a  sheep. 
As  in  those  days  most  of  the  inembers  of  the  First  Parish 
Church  were  farmers,  with  hay  and  grain  of  their  own  to 
look  to,  this  was  accepted  as  a  comfortable  doctrine, 
worthy  of  all  honor. 

Doctor  Abijah  kept  a  dining-room  sideboard  well 
stocked  with  good  liquor.  All  the  well-to-do  people  in 
the  parish  did  the  same,  and  as  the  parson  was  more 
forehanded  than  any  one  else,  he  w#s  of  course  justified  in 
laying  in  a  stock  of  good  old  fourth-proof  brandy  and 
venerable  port.  When  he  wished  to  incite  his  men  to 
unusual  activity  in  the  field,  he  sometimes  dealt  out  to 
them  portions  of  old  rye  with  his  own  hands  ;  it  was  well 
known  all  over  the  parish  that  the  doctor's  liquor  was  of 
the  very  best  quality.  This  was  before  the  days  of  the 
Father  Mathew  and  Washingtonian  societies,  and  the  doc 
tor  died  before  cold  water,  the  sparkling  and  bright,  came 
much  into  fashion.  He  was  a  man  who  carefully  guarded 
himself  against  every  excess.  The  "  creature,"  as  he 
called  it,  was  for  use,  not  abuse,  and  he  preached  that 
doctrine,  hammering  the  pulpit  cushion  with  his  strong 
fist  until  the  dust  flew  out  in  a  cloud. 

In  the  old  stone  manse  the  doctor  kept  open  house  for 
all  his  clerical  brethren  who  came  that  way,  and  they  did 
manage  to  come  in  a  pretty  steady  stream  all  the  year 
round.  There  was  good  eating  and  drinking  in  the 
manse  ;  ministers  have  always  been  known  to  have  a 
cultivated  taste  in  the  culinary  line.  The  doctor's  oldest 
daughter,  Ruth,  was  the  housekeeper.  She  had  "  put 
up  "  a  great  number  of  the  clergy,  and  she  was  wont  to 


I92  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

say  that  she  liked  to  see  the  poor  brethren  go  away  from 
the  manse  door  looking  a  little  less  gaunt  and  thin  than 
when  they  came.  The  manse  kitchen  was  a  reservoir  of 
bounty  to  the  whole  neighborhood.  All  the  tramps  and 
itinerant  beggars,  all  those  who  plied  wandering  trades, 
the  essence-man,  the  pack-peddler,  the  clock-mender, 
the  poor  tinker,  knew  their  way  to  that  door  where  free 
grace  flowed  out  in  the  shape  of  liberal  meals  of  good, 
plain,  wholesome  food.  For  years  a  table  was  always 
duly  spread  in  that  vast  kitchen,  with  its  great  fireplace 
and  brick  oven,  for  these  chance  guests,  and  not  one  day 
in  the  year  were  they  wanting.  He  who  giveth  to  the 
poor  lendeth  to  the  Lord  ;  Doctor  Abijah's  landings 
were  very  large  in  this  way,  and  seemed  to  bring  in  a 
good  interest,  judging  from  his  productive  fields,  and 
bursting  barns,  and  the  fat  cattle  in  his  pastures. 

This  kitchen,  in  its  way  a  special  New  England  insti 
tution,  was  well  ruled  by  Ruth  Manners,  the  Martha  of 
that  family.  The  doctor's  invalid  wife  occupied  a  large 
upper  chamber,  where  she  was  moved  daily  from  the  bed 
to  the  couch,  but  never  passed  the  door.  Ruth,  though 
she  was  tall  and  stout,  had  incisive  ways  and  a  certain 
subacid  in  her  temper,  which  reminded  one  of  the  flavor 
of  her  favorite  summer  pippins.  There  was  also  a 
twinkle  of  humor  which  recalled  the  old  man,  and  she 
could  give  a  hard  thrust  and  administer  a  needed  lesson 
in  a  joke.  Ruth  said  if  she  could  not  jest  sometimes 
between  the  ministers  and  the  beggars,  she  would  get  the 
"  hypo,"  and  the  "  hypo  "  above  all  things  was  the  malady 
she  abhorred.  She  was  endowed  with  all  her  father's 
indomitable  energy  and  took  her  theology  in  the  same 
strong  unadulterated  way.  She  was  accounted  a  house 
keeper  of  unrivaled  excellence.  Her  worldliness  and 
other-worldliness  were  mixed  in  equal  parts  exactly  like 
Dr.  Abijah's.  She  always  took  the  lead  in  the  female 
prayer-meetings,  and  was  considered  to  have  a  gift  in 


MARTHA    A. YD  MARY  OF  SCRIPTl'Rl:.          193 

petitioning  the  throne  of  grace  second  to  none.  Ruth 
kept  an  eye  on  all  female  delinquents  in  the  parish,  and 
prodded  their  sins,  great  and  small,  in  a  way  the  customs 
of  our  time  would  consider  intrusive,  if  not  indecent. 
She  made  inquisition  into  consciences,  and  let  the  giddy 
girls  and  foolish  young  matrons  know  that  her  sleepless 
eye  was  upon  them.  She  was,  of  ^course,  disliked  by 
some,  but  the  admirable  way  in  which  she  seconded  all 
her  father's  endeavors  to  further  the  material  and  spiritual 
interests  of  the  community  were  gratefully  acknowledged. 

The  Mary  of  Scripture  was  not  wanting  in  the  doctor's 
family,  although  her  name  happened  to  be  Hope.  She 
was  the  youngest  child,  the  flower  of  the  flock.  Several 
little  ones  had  died  between  Hope  and  Ruth,  and  there 
fore,  even  in  her  grown  and  matured  state,  she  always 
seemed  a  child  to  her  energetic  elder  sister.  Hope  was 
slender  and  fair,  mild  of  speech,  and  with  a  still  tongue. 
Her  life,  much  of  it,  had  been  spent  in  her  mother's  sick 
room,  where  she  read  aloud  books  of  an  exclusively  pious 
tone.  Though  devoutedly  religion^  Hope  had  none  of 
that  taste  for  leadership,  the  public  display  of  piety, 
for  which  her  sister  was  so  well  fitted.  A  touch  of 
sadness  and  dreamy  melancholy  clung  to  Hope  from 
having  grown-up  in  that  shaded  sick-chamber  and  imbib 
ing  large  doses  of  low-spirited  religious  literature,  such 
as  Hervey's  "  Meditations  Among  the  Tombs,"  a  favorite 
book  with  her  invalid  mother.  Her  active  sister  mean 
time  faced  all  the  difficulties  of  the  farm,  and  kitchen, 
and  dairy,  and  kept  her  weather  eye  out  on  the  parish 
with  salutary  results. 

Hope  perhaps  had  hardly  dreamed  of  a  lover.  The 
heavy  hand  of  duty  pressed  down  all  the  impulses  of  her 
young  nature,  and  she  yielded  without  complaint.  But 
one  season  there  came  to  the  manse  a  young  minister 
who  had  just  completed  his  course  of  study,  and  being 
slightly  run  down  in  health,  had  been  invited  by  Dr. 


194  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

Abijah  to  spend  a  few  weeks  on  the  farm,  and  breathe 
the  pure  air  of  the  mountains.  This  young  man  was 
entirely  unknown  to  the  family,  but  he  soon  became 
domesticated  in  the  great  spare  chamber  where  Ruth  put 
him  to  lodge.  He  had  the  run  of  the  old  doctor's  library 
and  study,  and  the  family  found  him  a  pleasant  inmate. 
He  preached  a  few  times  in  the  parish  meeting-house, 
and  some  of  the  long-headed  people  even  then  predicted 
for  him  a  great  career.  To  the  old  doctor,  who  plowed, 
and  harrowed,  and  top-dressed,  and  sub-soiled  his  ser 
mons  much  as  he  did  his  land,  this  young  man's  enthusi 
asm  and  strong  convictions  seemed  a  little  too  fervid  and 
high-colored.  Still  he  liked  him,  and  in  time  came  to 
look  upon  him  almost  in  the  light  of  a  son. 

The  young  man  saw  less  of  Hope  than  of  other  mem 
bers  of  the  household,  but  the  glimpses  he  caught  of  her 
pure  young  face  and  slender  form  tantalized  him,  and 
made  him  desire  to  know  her  better.  It  was  a  little 
strange  that  Hope,  in  that  distant  shaded  chamber,  so 
unearthly  in  its  quiet,  always  knew  when  he  entered  or 
left  the  house,  and  learned  to  distinguish  his  step  from 
all  others.  It  was  before  the  days  of  muscular  Christi 
anity  and  athletic  training,  but  the  young  minister  did 
occasionally  take  a  turn  in  the  field  along  with  his  father 
in  Israel,  and  manifestly  to  the  improvement  of  his 
health,  and  it  was  then  he  began  to  preach  to  Hope 
about  fresh  air  and  the  necessity  of  out-door  exercise  to 
bring  roses  into  her  cheeks.  The  pale  blush  roses  were 
already  there  while  she  listened.  Then  began  those 
walks  in  a  far-off  old-fashioned  summer  time,  when  the 
birds  sang  as  sweetly  as  they  do  now — walks  through 
the  woods,  along  the  river,  and  over  Saddleback  to  the 
cascade  and  the  glen.  He  taught  her  a  beautiful  theo 
logy  spelled  out  of  the  flowers,  and  clouds,  and  sunbeams, 
and  one  day  in  a  pretty  avenue  of  old  trees,  still  known 
as  "  Hope's  Walk,"  he  asked  her  to  be  his  wife. 


HOPE'S  STRUGGLE.  195 

But  a  terrible  struggle  had  arisen  in  Hope's  breast. 
She  was  skilled  in  the  morbid  anatomy  which  belongs  to 
her  peculiar  phase  of  pietism  and  has  always  prevailed 
in  the  Puritan  land.  Self-dissection  had  been  for  years 
a  favorite  religious  exercise  with  her  nervous  invalid 
mother,  and  Hope  knew  all  its  torments.  Could  she 
erect  a  mere  mortal  in  the  place  of  her  God,  when  he 
had  heretofore  ruled  alone  in  her  heart,  and  if  so  was  it 
right  or  possible  to  leave  the  ailing  mother  who  had 
lived  on  her  affection  and  sapped  her  vitality  from  child 
hood  ?  Poor  Hope  said  no,  said  it  with  tears  and  trem 
blings  and  unutterable  pain.  But  after  the  young  man 
had  gone  away  the  futile  passion  of  grief  which  swept 
over  her  for  weeks  and  months  came  near  shattering  her 
life.  It  was  after  the  physician  had  declared  that  he 
could  do  nothing  more  for  her  that  Hope,  thinking  she 
was  about  to  die,  told  all  the  sad  little  story  to  her  father, 
how  she  had  learned  to  know  her  own  heart,  and  how 
she  loved  his  young  friend  with  all  the  intensity  of 
her  nature. 

Dr.  Abijah,  with  his  usual  promptness,  cut  the  Gordian 
knot  by  sitting  down  and  writing  frankly  and  freely  to 
his  young  friend.  He  recounted  the  whole  case  up  to 
fifteenthly,  and  bade  him  come  back.  The  mother,  too, 
sent  him  her  blessing  from  her  sick  couch.  It  had  been 
borne  in  upon  her. soul  that  she  must  give  up  Hope  to 
the  chosen  servant  of  the  Lord,  and  she,  though  a  poor 
broken  reed,  was  ready  to  obey.  It  was  all  couched  in 
rather  stiff  old-fashioned  phrase,  but  it  had  a  true  heart 
beat  in  it.  The  letter  was  sent  off,  and  it  was  a  long, 
very  long,  time  before  the  answer  came — the  young 
minister  had  been  traveling  about,  preaching  in  different 
places  as  "  candidate  " — and  poor  Hope's  sufferings  were 
hard  to  bear.  At  last  it  came.  Dr.  Abijah,  a  strong 
man,  with  no  knowledge  of  such  a  thing  as  a  nerve  in 
his  body,  was  visibly  shaken  when  he  took  the  letter  from 


*96  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

the  post-office,  and  carrying  it  out  into  the  field  with  him 
sat  down  on  the  stone-wall  under  a  wide-spreading  wal 
nut  tree,  and  opened  its  ample  sheet  of  foolscap,  sealed 
with  a  great  splash  of  red  wax,  and  read. 

His  young  friend  had  been  placed  in  a  terrible  position. 
His  letter  was  kind,  brotherly,  Christian.  It  bore  all  the 
marks  of  pain  and  deep  feeling,  but  the  truth  must  be 
told  :  Before  the  doctor's  letter  had  reached  him  he  had 
engaged  himself  to  a  dear  friend  of  his  sister,  an  early 
playmate  of  his  own.  The  doctor  had  done  many  a  hard 
stint  of  work,  both  in  the  home  acre  and  in  the  pulpit, 
but  the  hardest  he  ever  had  to  do  came  to  him  that  day 
when  he  was  forced  to  carry  the  news  to  his  girl  But 
Hope,  after  a  sharp  attack  of  nervous  prostration,  was 
apparently  resigned.  She  grew  more  active  in  her  habits 
from  that  day,  and  went  and  prayed  in  the  female  prayer- 
meeting,  and  paid  visits  to  neighbors  she  had  seldom 
called  upon.  She  even  offered  her  assistance  to  Ruth  in 
the  kitchen  and  dairy,  and  took  some  interest  in  the 
animals  on  the  farm. 

Well,  the  old  minister  died,  then  Ruth,  and  finally  the 
weakly  mother,  and  the  "  glebe  "  and  the  old  manse  were 
left  to  Hope.  She  was  a  comparatively  rich  woman  now. 
There  was  no  need  of  exertion,  and  she  rented  most  of 
the  farm,  reserving  only  the  home-fields  and  "  Hope's 
Walk."  Sitting  in  the  shady  old  manse  in  those  days, 
Hope  Manners  heard  echoes  of  the  fame  of  the  man 
whom  she  had  loved.  The  long-headed  farmers  had 
been  right.  He  had  turned  out  a  great  preacher.  She 
sat  and  wondered  in  her  gentle  heart  if  she  could  not 
secretly,  in  some  humble  way,  help  forward  his  cherished 
aims.  She  longed  to  strike  hands  and  keep  step  with 
him,  though  he  knew  it  not,  in  his  life  work.  Stealthily 
she  poured  out  her  bounty  for  that  work,  for  she  had 
striven  to  find  out  all  that  he  was  doing,  thinking,  and 
planning  in  the  city  where  he  lived.  At  last,  when  she 


HOPE'S  GOLD  EX  AFTERNOON.  19? 

died  and  her  will  was  opened,  it  was  found  she  had  left 
him  her  fortune  to  further,  as  she  put  it,  "  some  great 
and  good  object  of  humanity  on  which  his  heart  was  set." 
The  villagers  knew  Hope  had  had  one  great  chance  in 
life,  and  had  lost  it.  They  knew  she  was  what  the  world 
calls  "  disappointed."  A  tender  romance  clung  about 
her  as  the  first  love  of  a  distinguished  man.  But  she 
was  more  than  calm  as  she  grew  old,  she  was  merry  and 
bright  in  her  own  gentle  way.  Always  beautiful,  she 
grew  more  so  as  life  advanced.  Love  had  brought  her 
great  suffering,  but  it  had  developed  and  ennobled  her 
nature.  She  had  drunk  of  the  wine  of  sacrifice,  but  she 
had  also  tasted  the  bread  of  life,  and  her  afternoon  was 
golden. 


CHAPTER    XXII. 

FASCINATING    MRS.   BRIDGENORTH. 

WE  are  all  very  sensitive  about  the  standing  of  our 
village,  and  despise  nearly  every  other  town  within 
a  radius  of  fifty  miles.  We  have  a  great  deal  of  public 
spirit,  and  when  a  proposal  was  made  to  organize  a  fire 
department  and  provide  the  village  with  a  small  engine 
and  hook  and  ladder  company  there  was  great  enthusiasm 
among  the  young  men  and  boys.  They  soon  formed  a 
fine  company,  with  a  pretty  bright  blue  and  white  uniform 
and  shiny  helmets.  A  fire  very  seldom  occurs  in  the  vil 
lage,  not  more  than  once  or  twice  a  year.  But  the  boys, 
with  their  new  and  exciting  toy  of  an  engine,  naturally 
loved  to  see  it  work,  and  desired  to  run  to  a  fire  at  least 
once  a  week.  The  result  was  that  hay-stacks,  old  sheds, 
and  some  tumble-down  barns  and  outhouses  on  the  bor 
ders  of  the  town  mysteriously  burst  into  flames  every  few 
nights,  and  the  rush  and  hurrah  boys  of  a  fire  alarm  be 
came  so  frequent  that  delicate  women  were  thrown  into 
hysterics,  and  a  few  people  with  heart  disease  went  off 
with  frightful  suddenness.  The  magistrate  was  at  last 
obliged  to  lock  the  engine,  hook  and  ladder  and  all,  in 
the  engine-house  and  put  the  key  in  his  pocket,  in  order 
to  save  the  village  from  utter  destruction  by  fire,  and  to 
prevent  the  people  from  going  mad. 

But  this  was  all  owing  to  the  exuberance  of  youth.  We 
wisely  shut  our  eyes  to  such  boyish  scrapes,  and  still 
cherish  the  belief  that  we  are  a  very  moral,  good  sort  of 
people.  But  the  sad  fact  remains  that  now  when  a  real 
fire  breaks  out  in  the  village  our  engine  refuses  to  spout 
water,  our  hooks  and  ladders  are  practically  useless,  and 


EVILS    THAT  COME  BY  RAIL.  199 

we  are  obliged  to  send  off  to  a  neighboring  town  for  aid. 
Still,  as  Providence  loves  to  protect  the  innocent,  and 
virtue,  as  we  know,  is  always  rewarded  in  this  world,  fires 
very  rarely  occur,  and  we  have  come  to  feel  in  our  un 
protected  condition  that  we  are  special  favorites  of 
Heaven. 

Outwardly  we  are  a  very  decent  people.  No  gin-shops, 
no  disorder  manifest,  and  if  an  intoxicated  man  appears 
on  the  street  we  always  know  he  came  in  on  the  railroad. 
This  is  an  idea  cherished  fondly  by  the  old  people  of  the 
town.  Every  thing  evil — small-pox,  diphtheria,  measles, 
extravagance,  vanity,  impiety,  even  the  seven-year  locusts 
— came  in  on  the  railroad.  So,  Heaven  be  thanked,  most 
of  our  intoxicated  and  disreputable  persons,  like  stray 
gipsies,  organ-grinders,  beggars,  and  tramps,  do  come  in 
on  the  railroad,  and  are  *  jugged  '  by  the  watchful  se 
lectmen,  who  put  them  in  a  kind  of  human  pound  on  the 
confines  of  the  village,  where  they  are  made  to  saw  wood 
in  payment  for  a  night's  lodging  and  a  meal  or  two,  and 
then  are  sent  packing  about  their  business  or  no  business, 
as  the  case  may  be.  Did  you  ever  think  of  it — what  an 
admirable  invention  this  is  of  getting  rid  of  the  evils  of 
life,  just  to  send  them  packing,  with  a  devil-may-care 
indifference,  until  all  the  roads  and  lanes  of  the  country 
side  are  filled  with  irresponsible  tramps,  and  lonely  women 
and  feeble  old  people  quake  inwardly  with  the  fear  of 
being  murdered  in  their  beds  ?  In  spite  of  the  "  no 
license"  vote  in  our  village  and  the  closing  of  the  rum- 
shops,  there  are  more  than  ten  places  known  to  the  in 
itiated  where  liquor  can  be  obtained.  This  knowledge 
has  crystallized  into  a  kind  of  secret  society,  whose 
members  give  and  take  the  grip  and  countersign.  They 
nod,  wink,  smile,  and  it  all  means  one  thing.  Yet  every 
thing  is  outwardly  quiet  and  orderly.  People  speak  of 
these  little  blemishes  under  the  breath  —  in  a  half 
whisper. 


200  VILLAGE  PJWl'OGKAPHS. 

With  other  evils  which  came  in  on  the  railroad  must 
be  classed  our  summer  boarders.  The  villagers  have  a 
slight  distrust  of  city  people,  and  they  think  New  Yorkers 
a  little  more  "dubious,"  than  other  tribes  of  urban  folk. 
I  hardly  know  why,  for  a  few  persons  from  the  metropo 
lis  have  brought  a  good  deal  of  money  into  the  town,  and 
have  been  generous  in  contributing  to  the  repair  of  the 
church,  to  the  library,  and  other  public  objects,  and  are 
personally  much  respected.  It  is  a  vague  feeling  not 
easy  to  define,  and  has  been  somewhat  intensified  of  late 
by  a  circumstance  I  am  about  to  relate.  The  summer 
people,  in  spite  of  our  heavenly-minded  innocence  and 
purity  of  manners,  have  their  own  complaint  to  make. 
They  say  that  when  a  stranger  comes  to  the  village  with 
a  reputation  for  riches — and  all  city  folk  are  supposed  to 
be  rich — he  is  set  upon  by  the  neighboring  Bedouins 
exactly  as  if  he  were  in  the  Arabian  desert.  Two  prices 
are  charged  for  every  thing  he  buys  in  the  town.  Every 
bunch  of  asparagus,  head  of  lettuce,  and  box  of  straw 
berries,  raised  under  his  very  eyes,  is  shamelessly  put  up 
far  above  what  they  would  cost  in  the  city.  The  butcher 
and  fishman  raise  their  wares  fifty  per  cent.  The  livery- 
stable  keeper  merrily  elevates  his  charges  to  a  fancy 
figure  for  the  worst  old  "plugs"  ever  seen.  He  would 
be  called  a  bloated  monopolist,  perhaps,  as  he  is  the  only 
liveryman  we  have,  and,  poor  soul,  his  season  is  short. 
But  the  blinded  city  man  says  he  can  get  no  idea  of  what 
the  natives  pay  for  any  thing.  He  is  supposed  to  have  a 
gold  mine  in  his  pocket,  and  is  a  miserable  object  of 
prey,  and  must  betake  himself  to  less  primitive,  pure- 
minded,  and  bucolic  neighborhoods  in  order  to  preserve 
a  shred  of  his  faith  in  human  nature.  But  these  stories* 
are  mainly  exaggerations.  We  are  an  extremely  good 
and  honest  people  ;  and  if  the  New  Yorker  does  not 
know  how  to  take  us,  it  is  his  own  fault. 

Mrs.  Martin  is  our  best  known  boarding-house  lady. 


./  BOARDING-HOUSE,  LADY.  201 

Her  house,  though  comfortable,  has  not  been  much  mod 
ernized.  She  clings  with  faithful  affection  to  her  peniten 
tial  hair-cloth  sofas  and  chairs,  her  big-patterned  ingrain 
carpets  and  slippery  oil  cloth.  The  most  trying  thing 
about  her  Lares  and  Penates,  which  Mrs.  Deacon  Hil- 
dreth  calls  "  lairs  and  peanuts,"  are  the  photographs  of 
her  dyspeptic,  aggressive,  low-spirited  looking  relatives 
which  in  their  black  frames  break  out  all  over  the  walls, 
and  give  a  kind  of  measly  look  to  the  ugly  wall  paper. 
Mrs.  Martin  is  very  bland.  She  has  a  slightly  stuffed 
look,  from  being  puffy,  and  short  of  breath,  and  wearing 
her  dresses  too  much  girt  in  at  the  waist.  She  dresses 
her  hair  in  the  old-fashioned  way — brushed  smoothly 
over  her  ears  as  if  glued  to  her  skull,  and  fastened  with 
side-combs.  The  good  woman  talks  about  her  boarders 
as  if  she  had  boarded  them  as  infants  in  arms,  and  had 
brought  them  up  by  hand.  She  calls  the  ladies  "  my 
dear,"  and  pats  the  men  on  the  back  in  a  truly  maternal 
and  encouraging  manner.  Though  not  the  superior  cook 
that  Aunt  Dido  is,  she  keeps  her  house  in  better  order, 
and  is  not  troubled  with  any  of  the  eccentricities  of 
genius  which  do  sometimes  perturb  Aunt  Dido's  orbit. 

Mr.  Allibone,  the  cashier  of  the  village  bank,  is  Mrs. 
Martin's  pet  boarder.  She  shows  his  room  to  new 
comers  as  a  model  of  all  that  a  boarder's  room  should 
be.  The  walls  are  decorated  with  numerous  chromos. 
It  is,  in  fact,  a  chromo  paradise.  Mr.  Allibone  also  has 
a  fancy  for  clocks,  and  he  has  six  in  different  parts  of  the 
room,  all  ticking  away  for  dear  life.  The  little  gifts  of 
his  sisters,  nieces,  cousins,  and  aunts  are  all  ranged 
around  his  bureau,  and  dusted  daily  by  his  own  careful 
hands.  There  are  pen-wipers,  shaving-paper  cases,  pin 
cushions — painted,  frilled,  and  embroidered — scent  bot 
tles  tied  up  in  ribbons,  handkerchief-cases,  and  glove- 
boxes,  all  dear  to  the  good  little  "man's  heart.  He  is  an 
excellent  bank  officer,  and  would  be  trusted  with  untold 


VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

sums  of  money,  but  he  is  mildly  laughed  at  by  the  girls,  and 
as  he  has,  until  of  late,  for  a  good  many  years  evinced  no 
intention  to  marry,  little  romantic  or  sentimental  interest 
has  attached  to  his  small,  neat  person.  His  little  feet 
and  nice  hands  are  as  pretty-  as  a  fine  lady's.  His  hair 
sets  up  brusquely  from  his  head  in  front,  and  there  is 
something  clerkly  and  exact  in  all  his  movements.  A 
self-importance  attaches  to  his  walk  and  gestures.  He 
feels  the  bank  to  be  the  center  of  the  village,  and  he,  as 
the  cashier  of  said  bank,  is  the  hub  toward  which  all  the 
spokes  of  the  wheel  converge.  He  carries  the  bank 
around  with  a  certain  dignity,  and  does  not  like  big, 
loud-voiced  men  who  have  no  respect  for  under-sized 
people  ;  for  there  is  always  the  present  fear  that  these 
rough  persons  may  jostle  the  bank  from  off  his  shoulders, 
and  leave  him  in  his  own  native  insignificance.  He  is 
painfully  methodical  and  always  uses  his  white  handker 
chief  with  a  certain  explosion,  called  by  the  village 
people  "  trumpeting,"  just  as  he  reaches  Mrs.  Martin's 
gate. 

I  think  Mr.  Ailibone  had  always  been  a  good  deal 
afraid  of  the  lady  boarders  until  Mrs.  Bridgenorth  came 
early  one  spring,  and  she  was  so  seductive  in  her  manner, 
poor  Mr.  Ailibone  succumbed  to  the  charm  almost  with 
out  a  struggle.  No  one  knew  just  who  Mrs.  Bridge- 
north  was,  although  on  her  arrival  early  in  March  she 
had  mentioned  a  certain  Hon.  Mr.  Farrington,  member 
of  Congress  from  another  state,  as  her  brother-in-law. 
Farrington  was  pretty  well  known  by  reputation,  and  Mrs. 
Martin  was  very  glad  to  let  her  best  room  to  so  distin 
guished  a  "  party  "  long  before  the  opening  of  the  regu 
lar  season.  Mrs.  Bridgenorth  dressed  in  deep  black, 
with  a  good  deal  of  heavy  crepe  on  her  gown  and  a  long 
sweeping  veil  pinned  to  a  little  close  bonnet,  within 
which  she  wore  a  very  becoming  widow's  cap.  She  often 
tied  a  large  quantity  of  crisp  white  illusion  under  her 


SNARES  AXD  PITFALLS.  203 

chin,  and  placed  a  large  bunch  of  violets  in  the  beautifully 
fitting  bodice  of  her  gown.  As  Mrs.  Bridgenorth's 
complexion  was  fine,  this  mode  of  dress  attracted  more 
attention  than  brilliant  colors.  Without  being  strictly 
handsome  she  had  many  of  the  elements  of  beauty — an 
elegant  small  figure,  fine  eyes,  and  perfect  teeth.  Her 
nose,  however,  was  somewhat  sharp,  and  her  light  hair 
under  the  widow's  cap  had  a  lifeless,  towy  look,  with  a 
suspicion  of  the  bleaching  process.  She  was  much 
younger  at  a  little  distance  than  close  at  hand,  and 
though  our  villagers  are  so  simple-minded,  some  of  them 
thought  they  detected  traces  of  rouge  about  the  lady's 
cheek-bones. 

The  widow  had  the  purring,  caressing,  kittenish  ways 
of  a  small  woman,  who  has  enjoyed  no  end  of  admira 
tion  and  petting.  Her  dear  Rolf,  as  she  called  her 
departed  husband,  had  spoiled  her,  and  made  her  shame 
fully  dependent.  She  ingratiated  herself  with  good  Mrs. 
Martin,  fashioned  for  her  a  new  cap  from  lace  and  rib 
bon,  and  fairly  bewitched  the  old  lady  out  of  all  ordinary 
prudence.  At  that  early  season  there  were  no  other 
boarders.  Mrs.  Martin  set  out  a  charming  little  round 
dinner  and  tea-table  for  two,  and  across  this  small  board 
Mrs.  Bridgenorth  made  eyes  at  good  little  Mr.  Allibone. 
She  told  him  how  she  had  lost  a  fine  fortune  by  the 
speculations  of  a  rascally  trustee,  having  saved  out  of 
the  wreck  only  a  paltry  hundred  thousand  ;  how  her  two 
children,  Paul  and  May,  were  at  boarding-school,  and 
what  sweet  creatures  they  were.  She  had  come  to  the 
village,  she  said,  because  she  needed  rest  and  quiet.  She 
was  an  ardent  lover  of  nature,  and  her  hope  was  to  hide 
herself  and  her  troubles  far  away  from  people,  among 
these  restful  hills,  and  here  she  had  found  such  charm 
ing  society — "  Oh,  so  charming,"  and  she  clasped  her 
hands  impulsively,  as  she  gazed  into  poor  little  Allibone's 
face.  He  was  near-sighted,  and  wore  spectacles,  and 


204  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

although  he  was  considered  an  excellent  judge  of  doubt 
ful  currency,  how  could  he  tell  that  Mrs.  Bridgenorth 
was  not  all  pure  gold  as  she  sat  there  weaving  her  little 
spell,  and  every  now  and  then  throwing  in  a  word  or  two 
about  the  Hon.  Farrington  and  her  other  distinguished 
connections  ?  She  looked  young  and  charming  when 
her  eyes  sparkled,  and  the  sinister  lines  in  her  face  and 
the  meaning  curl  of  her  lip  were  not  as  easy  for  an 
experienced  cashier  to  detect  as  the  false  ring  in  a  coun 
terfeit  dollar. 

Mrs.  Bridgenorth  pervaded  the  whole  house.  She 
arranged  flowers  in  the  clumsy  old-fashioned  vases  ;  she 
taught  Mrs.  Martin  how  to  make  salads  and  sauces  ;  she 
re-arranged  the  furniture  in  the  sitting-room  and  parlor, 
and  skipped  and  chirped  and  rustled  up  stairs  and  down. 
Poor  Mr.  Allibone  was  living  an  enchanted  life  in  those 
days.  The  rows  of  figures  in  his  bank  books  danced 
before  his  eyes,  and  seemed  to  be  set  to  music,  while 
they  tied  themselves  up  into  true  lover's  knots.  Mrs. 
Bridgenorth  was  so  assured  and  self-possessed,  so  much 
the  mistress  of  the  situation,  she  always  knew  just  what 
to  do,  while  he  grew  ever  more  timid  and  backward. 
She  took  him  out  walking  at  times  as  if  he  had  been  a 
lap-dog  tied  to  a  chain,  and  when  they  came  back  she 
always  wore  the  wild  flowers  he  had  gathered  for  her  in 
a  great  breast-knot  on  her  black  gown.  Being  the  most 
methodical  of  men,  when  he  mislaid  a  paper  one  day  a 
clerk  asked  him  if  he  were  ill.  He  had  not  lost  many 
hours'  sleep  at  night  for  twenty  years,  but  now  he  was 
often  tossing  about  in  the  darkness,  with  broken  visions 
floating  before  his  eyes,  in  which  he  saw  the  widow  in  all 
her  attitudes  and  expressions,  the  glance  of  her  eye,  the 
way  she  used  her  hands,  and  the  glitter  of  her  rings  ;  her 
voice  and  accent  came  back,  and  those  charming  confi 
dences,  when  she  told  him  of  her  loneliness,  her  need  of 
sympathy,  her  dependence,  and  how  ill-fitted  she  was  to 


"A   FAV£    WO  MAX,    BY  JOVE"  205 

go  through  life  without  a  protector.  For  so  staid  and 
orderly  a  man  his  dreams  and  visions  were  of  the 
wildest. 

Mrs.  Bridgenorth  went  to  church  every  Sunday,  and 
when  the  plate  was  passed  she  always  folded  a  crisp  new 
greenback  with  her  beautifully  gloved  ringers,  and  dropped 
it  deftly  within.  In  time  all  the  best  people  called  upon 
her,  and  she  was  freely  invited  to  the  mild  dissipations  of 
the  village.  If  she  yawned  a  little  behind  her  fan  over 
these  rather  diluted  excitements,  she  was  still  gracious. 
She  was  not  "  bookish,"  and  she  had  not  much  conver 
sation  certainly  with  women,  but  it  was  a  study  to  see 
how  she  dressed  and  moved.  Judge  Magnus  pronounced 
her  a  fine  woman,  by  Jove,  and  passed  one  or  two  even 
ings  with  her  talking  over  Washington  life,  where  it 
seemed  she  spent  a  part  of  each  season.  He  thought  it 
very  odd  he  had  never  met  the  delightful  widow,  but 
then  you  know  she  had  been  in  deep  mourning  for  a  few 
years  past.  Mrs.  Magnus  patronized  her,  took  her  out 
driving  in  her  carriage,  and  made  a  dinner-party  espe 
cially  for  her  benefit.  Mrs.  Magnus  prided  herself  on  her 
penetration.  The  feeling  was  pretty  general  that  Mrs. 
Bridgenorth  had  come  excellently  well  recommended. 
It  was  one  of  those  social  myths  which,  though  founda- 
tionless,  are  easily  spread  abroad. 

The  widow  occasionally  dropped  into  the  bank,  and 
offered  checks  drawn  on  a  city  bank  where  she  kept  an 
account.  Her  checks,  though  generally  small,  were 
always  duly  honored. 

It  was  about  the  middle  of  April,  and  Mrs.  Martin  had 
gone  to  spend  the  day  with  a  sick  relative,  and  had  left 
the  house  entirely  at  her  lady  boarder's  disposal.  It 
was  just  at  this  time  that  poor  Mr.  Allibone  had  decided 
to  take  a  great  step  in  life.  He  had  slept  but  little  for 
the  past  week.  Mr.  Allibone  said  to  himself  that  it  was 
his  duty  to  take  this  step,  for  had  she  not  told  him  she 


206  r  ILL  AGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

was  alone  in  the  world,  that  she  needed  a  protector  ? 
Had  she  not  asked  his  advice,  in  the  sweetest  way,  about 
the  education  of  her  children  and  the  management  of  her 
estate  ?  Allibone  felt  it  would  be  unmanly  not  to  come 
to  this  charming  woman's  aid,  even  at  the  sacrifice  of  all 
his  bachelor  habits.  On  this  particular  morning  she  rose 
early,  and  when  she  had  kissed  Mrs.  Martin  good-by  with 
effusion,  she  went  to  her  room,  and  stealing  about  on  tip 
toe  packed  her  trunk  swiftly  and  carefully.  This  busi 
ness  completed,  she  put  on  her  bonnet,  locked  the  door 
of  her  chamber,  and  walked  down  to  the  bank,  where,  with 
an  easy  and  confident  air,  she  offered  the  paying  teller 
a  check  for  one  thousand  dollars,  drawn  by  the  Hon.  Mr. 
Farrington  to  her  order.  The  clerk  looked  at  it  with  some 
curiosity.  It  was  a  different  kind  of  check  and  for  a 
much  larger  amount  than  any  she  had  ever  offered  before. 
He  scrutinized  it  a  moment,  and  then  handed  it  to  the 
cashier.  "  I  suppose,  of  course,  this  is  all  right."  Alli 
bone,  with  his  heart  in  his  mouth,  came  to  the  window. 
The  widow  smiled  on  him  enchantingly.  "  You  know," 
she  said  lightly,  "  Mr.  Farrington  is  the  guardian  of  my 
children.  He  has  sent  me  this  quarterly  check  to  pay 
for  their  education."  She  was  wearing  the  flowers  he 
had  given  her  the  night  before.  It  did  not  occur  to  him 
to  show  the  least  doubt,  or  to  make  an  inquiry  even,  and 
with  his  own  hands  he  counted  out  the  money  in  bills  of 
a  large  denomination.  She  thanked  him  and  said  ex 
pressively  : 

"  Mrs.  Martin  is  absent  to-day.  Come  home  early,  and 
we  shall  have  a  tete-a-tete  dinner."  His  heart  gave  a 
leap  ;  it  was  then  he  meant  to  take  the  step. 

Mrs.  Bridgenorth  strolled  out  of  the  bank  and  crossed 
the  street  to  the  livery-stable.  She  engaged  one  of 
Haines's  easiest  carnages  for  a  morning  drive.  Haines 
promised  to  have  the  carriage  at  the  house  inside  of  ten 
minutes.  She  went  home  and  sat  down  by  the  parlor 


THE    WIDOWS  DRIVE.  2Q^ 

window  waiting  with  her  things  on.  Haines  was  late  as 
usual,  and  her  hands  closed  with  a  nervous  effort  at  self- 
control,  and  her  face  grew  pinched  and  old  and  sharp 
with  anxiety.  The  carriage  came  at  last,  but  Mike  the 
Irishman  was  not  driving  ;  young  Haines  had  taken  his 
place.  However,  she  went  out  to  the  gate  and  said  in 
her  easiest  way:  "I  am  sending  off  a  small  trurk  by 
express.  Won't  you  be  kind  enough  to  bring  it  down 
from  my  room,  and  then  drive  me  over  to  the  station  ?  " 
The  cook  in  the  kitchen  with  some  surprise  caught  a 
glimpse  of  Mrs.  Bridgenorth  just  as  she  was  shutting  the 
hack  door.  Mrs.  Bridgenorth  had  intended  to  bribe 
Irish  Mike  to  drive  her  at  double-quick  to  the  station. 
She  dared  not  attempt  such  a  thing  with  young  Haines, 
so  she  sat  in  a  state  of  cold,  benumbed  dread  until  the 
station  was  reached.  Then  she  leaped  out  of  the  car 
riage  and  rushed  forward.  The  twelve  o'clock  train  was 
just  on  the  point  of  moving  out.  An  instant  more,  and 
she  would  have  lost  it.  To  his  utter  bewilderment  young 
Haines  saw  the  conductor  and  brakeman  lift  Mrs.  Bridge- 
north  on  to  the  platform  of  the  car,  while  two  baggage 
men  ran  and  seized  her  trunk  and  dashed  it  on  board. 

In  less  than  three  hours  poor  Mr.  Allibone  was  going 
wildly  about  with  his  hands  to  his  head,  dazed  and  lost. 
The  teller,  who  had  had  his  suspicions,  applied  to  the 
telegraph,  and  it  sent  back  the  dreadful  news  that  the 
one  thousand  dollar  check  was  a  skillful  forgery.  There 
were  no  funds  in  the  bank  belonging  to  the  Hon.  R.  Far- 
rington.  "  Well,"  said  Judge  Magnus  when  the  excitement 
was  seething,  "  we  are  all  in  the  same  boat."  She  had  left 
an  unpaid  board-bill  of  six  weeks  with  Mrs.  Martin,  she 
had  run  up  an  account  with  Haines,  and  had  neglected 
to  pay  her  washer-woman. 

But  they  were  not  all  in  the  same  boat.  Poor  Mr. 
Allibone  was  in  a  little  boat  of  his  own.  He  was  hit 
very  hard,  and  was  obliged  to  go  away  on  a  six  months' 


208  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

leave  of  absence  to  recruit.  When  he  came  back  he  was 
but  the  shadow  of  his  former  self.  It  did  not  affect  him 
much,  at  a  later  day,  to  learn  that  Mrs.  Bridgenorth  had 
been  arrested  as  a  notorious  confidence  woman.  His 
little  world  of  illusion  and  dreams  had  been  rudely 
shattered  to  pieces,  and  to  a  middle-aged  man  of  steady 
habits  that  means  disaster. 


CHAPTER  XXIII. 

A      STAGE-STRUCK      GIRL. 

THERE  are  days,  though  we  know  not  where  the 
mysterious  influences  come  from,  that  restring  every 
nerve  and  fiber  in  the  body  ;  and  we  tingle  all  over  with 
pleasurable  excitement  and  energy.  The  west  wind 
blows  and  our  mountain  breezes  join  merrily  in  the 
fray,  bringing  the  scent  of  fir  woods,  the  perfume  of 
meadows,  and  the  honied  sweetness  of  clover  fields. 
Small  violet  clouds  float  high  in  the  air  and  melt  into 
ether,  as  soap-bubbles  vanish  before  the  eyes  of  a  happy 
child.  All  the  trees  rustle  like  innumerable  fine  ladies 
in  stiff  brocade,  turning  up  the  white  edges  of  their 
leaves,  while  the  light  is  thrown  off  in  sparkles  from  the 
green  surface,  and  the  shadows  lie  cool  and  long  on  the 
dewy  grass  shaven  by  the  lawn-mower.  The  village 
street  is  a  beautiful  arched  bower  woven  close  with 
leaves  and  boughs,  and  through  gaps  in  the  covered  roof 
birds  fly  in  and  out.  The  brown  road  is  dappled  with 
great  patches  of  light  and  shade,  and  some  of  the  denser 
trees  look  black  in  the  sunshine.  Saddleback  and  the 
lesser  hills  have  come  out  of  the  spring  haze,  and  glow 
with  resplendent  azure  and  rose,  that  breathing  color 
that  appears  to  envelop  a  living  form,  and  seems  to  wave 
and  change  under  the  movements  of  a  soul. 

On  such  a  morning,  when  the  honeysuckle  and  white 
cluster  roses  are  just  ready  to  bloom  around  the  low 
windows  and  brown  porches  of  her  little  house,  Mrs. 
Maria  Dalrymple  loves  to  work  in  her  garden  early  in 
the  day  before  the  sun  gets  'round  to  the  great  horse- 


210  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

chestnut  that  shades  the  rear  of  her  house,  and  throws 
its  protecting  coolness  over  the  garden  and  flower-beds. 
Mrs.  Mariar,  as  her  friends  call  her,  has  a  great  taste 
for  roses,  and  cultivates  with  success  some  of  the  im 
proved  fashionable  varieties,  with  which  she  has  made 
acquaintance  through  the  newspapers  and  florists'  cata 
logues.  You  should  hear  her  talk  learnedly  of  her 
"Catherine  Mermaids,"  and  "Marshal  O'Neals,"  and 
"  Jack  Motts."  For  Mrs.  Mariar  has  not  the  remotest 
idea  how  these  names  are  pronounced  nor  what  they 
mean. 

Her  old  garden  is  a  charming  place,  turfy  and  cool, 
with  straight  rows  of  currant  and  gooseberry  bushes,  and 
a  delightful  mixture  of  new-time  and  old-time  flowers. 
It  has  clumps  of  trees  in  the  corners,  and  the  bushes  are 
picturesque  in  contrast  with  the  neatly-kept  vegetable 
beds  and  the  brilliant  flowers.  Mrs.  Mariar,  when  she  is 
working  in  the  garden,  looks  singularly  tall  and  gaunt. 
Her  cotton  dress-skirt  falls  in  straight  parallel  folds,  and 
she  appears  to  have  a  patent  hinge  in  her  back,  about  the 
lower  part  of  her  spine,  very  convenient  for  digging  with 
trowel  or  garden-hoe.  At  church  and  tea-parties,  and 
even  at  home,  when  dressed  for  company,  she  is  quite  a 
different  looking  person.  Then  she  puts  on  what  she 
calls  her  "  vanities  and  falsities,"  consisting  of  a  "  front" 
and  "  switch "  of  false  hair,  stays,  a  bustle,  starched 
petticoats,  and  other  inventions  by  which  a  gaunt  female 
form  is  ingeniously  padded  and  shaped  into  the  approved 
ideal  of  feminine  comeliness.  There  is  a  fiction  in  the 
mind  of  Mrs.  Mariar  that  no  one  ever  sees  her  without 
her  "  vanities  and  falsities,"  except  her  own  folks  and  her 
nearest  neighbors,  who,  of  course,  don't  count,  while  the 
fact  is  she  is  hardly  ever  seen  by  any  one  except  as  that 
vision  of  long,  meager,  unpadded  womanhood  in  a 
straight  calico  gown,  and  with  skimpy  gray  locks  brushed 
behind  her  large  ears.  She  keeps  up  the  same  illusion 


SSSS  Y.  211 

about  her  mourning  for  her  last  husband  (she  has  had 
two,  neither  of  them  good  for  much).  When  she  goes  to 
meeting  or  abroad  on  visiting  duty,  she  wears  her  crepe 
and  bombazine.  But  during  the  greater  part  of  her 
work-a-day  life  her  widow's  weeds  are  laid  aside  in  her 
bedroom  along  with  her  other  "  falsities  and  vanities." 

Mrs.  Mariar  keeps  a  cow  on  her  little  place  and  sells 
milk  to  some  of  her  neighbors.  The  milk  is  carried 
about  by  her  nephew  Alick,  the  boy  of  her  dead  sister 
whom  she  has  raised.  Alick's  sister,  known  to  every 
body  in  the  village  as  Sissy,  has  also  lived  with  her  aunt 
from  childhood.  Sissy  needs  none  of  those  vanities  and 
falsities  which  Mrs.  Mariar  uses  to  produce  a  youthful 
appearance.  She  has  a  charmingly  plump  little  figure, 
well  filled  out  in  every  respect,  and  a  pretty  face,  framed 
in  curly  hair,  which  she  wears  boy-fashion.  It  must  be 
confessed  Sissy  has  always  been  something  of  a  trial  to 
her  aunt,  for  she  has  as  much  spirit  and  independence  as 
most  American  girls,  and  is  rather  pert  from  being  over 
praised  and  petted.  Moreover,  her  head  was  turned  a 
year  ago  by  what  Mrs.  Mariar  calls  the  play-acting 
mania.  Sissy  once,  on  a  visit  to  some  relatives  in  a  dis 
tant  city,  was  taken  to  the  theater  a  few  times,  and  being 
young  and  very  impressionable  imbibed  a  passion  for  the 
stage.  She  also  read  of  Mary  Anderson  and  other 
"  stars,"  who  have  come  up  from  small  beginnings  to  be 
the  darlings  of  the  footlights.  So  on  her  return  home  the 
old  pleasures  and  duties  of  life  had  lost  their  charm.  Sissy 
dreamed  waking  and  sleeping  of  those  enchanting  scenes 
in  the  theater,  and  the  idea  for  the  time  took  possession 
of  her  soul  that  she  was  destined  to  become  a  great  tragic 
actress.  Poor  Mrs.  Mariar,  moving  in  her  narrow  do 
mestic  world  with  treadmill  steadiness,  thought  the  girl 
was  bewitched.  For  Sissy  put  on  grand  airs,  walked  with 
a  stage  strut,  and,  like  Mrs.  Siddons  speared  an  innocent 
potato  as  if  she  were  stabbing  a  perjured  villain,  and 


L 


212  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

spoke  in  deep  chest-tones.  She  also  took  to  practicing 
elocution  in  the  barn,  to  the  surprise  of  the  hens  and 
chickens,  and  the  disapprobation  of  Betty,  the  cow. 
Moreover,  she  had  persuaded  Alick  to  learn  parts  and 
practice  with  her  in  tragic  pieces,  and  had  almost  upset 
the  poor  lad  and  made  his  school  studies  seem  perfectly 
flat  and  distasteful.  They  sat  together  in  the  barn-swing 
at  moments  when  Sissy  deigned  to  put  off  her  high 
tragic  buskin,  and  with  arms  intertwined,  and  taking 
alternate  bites  out  of  the  same  apple,  while  the  light  stole 
in  dimly  through  the  high  barn  window,  they  talked  of 
"  starring  "  it  together  all  over  the  country,  of  making 
heaps  of  money  and  crowning  themselves  with  deathless 
fame.  Poor  Mrs.  Mariar,  when  she  found  out  what  was 
going  on,  scolded  and  stormed  terribly.  She  boxed 
Alick's  ears  and  sent  him  to  bed  without  his  supper  ;  but 
she  could  not  do  the  same  with  Sissy,  who  was  stronger 
than  she  was,  with  wrists  like  steel,  and  who  openly 
defied  her.  Finally,  after  shedding  floods  of  tears,  she 
sent  for  her  brother  Silas. 

For  a  girl  like  Sissy,  blessed  with  an  ardent,  devoted, 
constant  lover,  such  conduct  was  certainly  reprehensible. 
Her  bond  slave,  Rufus  Clover,  was  a  young  farmer,  inde 
pendent  in  maens,  and  belonging  to  the  old  farm  aristoc 
racy  of  the  country  side.  He  was  very  good-looking,  and 
had  received  a  fine  education.  His  sisters  could  see  noth 
ing  at  all  admirable  in  Sissy,  and  could  not  understand  his 
infatuation.  But  then,  brothers  do  not  marry  to  please 
their  sisters.  Sissy  played  with  Rufus  as  a  frisky  kitten 
plays  with  a  mouse.  At  times  she  threw  him  off  with  a 
cuff  of  her  velvet  paw,  and  then  she  drew  him  quite  close 
to  her  with  gentle  and  captivating  coyness.  But  one  in 
watching  her  maneuvers  could  hardly  help  believing 
that  in  the  end  she  would  scratch  his  eyes  out. 

Brother  Silas  lived  in  a  neighboring  town,  but  he  did 
most  of  his  trading,  bartering,  and  dickering  in  the  vil- 


HOMERIC  SWAGGER.  213 

lage.  Horse-dealing  was  his  main  vocation,  and  he  might 
often  be  seen  speeding  through  Main  Street,  a  new  colt 
attached  to  a  sulky  wherein  he  sat  with  his  feet  braced 
wide  apart,  his  whole  being,  to  the  rakish  set  of  his  old 
slouched  hat,  redolent  of 'the  horse-jockey.  His  nags 
always  kicked  up  a  terrible  dust  as  they  rushed  past,  and 
the  clatter  of  the  sulky  wheels  warned  every  one  to  keep 
out  of  the  way.  This  speeding  of  a  new  colt  at  a  two- 
forty  pace  was  a  pieee  of  swagger,  a  direct  challenge  to 
timid  buyers,  like  the  brag  of  old  Homeric  heroes  when 
they  came  out  in  front  of  the  lines  and  defied  the  cow 
ardly  foe  with  endless  self-vauntings.  It  was  a  method 
very  exciting  to  rash  people  who  wished  to  "swap  "  or 
purchase  a  horse,  and  before  night  Silas  was  almost 
always  able  to  sell  his  new  animal  at  a  pretty  large 
advance  on  what  he  had  paid  for  it.  Sometimes  he  took 
another  horse  with  good  "  boot."  He  had  a  way  of  cast 
ing  a  glamour  about  horse-flesh  peculiarly  his  own.  It 
was  even  said  he  could  make  an  old  rackabones  look 
plump  and  youthful  by  some  sort  of  magic  known  only 
to  himself.  A  spavined,  halt,  wind-broken  creature 
would  under  his  manipulations  come  out  for  the  time 
being  as  sound  as  a  roach.  Kickers,  shyers,  and  balky 
nags  beneath  his  hands  were  like  lambs.  When  people 
had  been  bitten  by  Silas  in  a  bargain  they  generally  said 
nothing  about  it,  for  we  all  know  misery  loves  company. 
And  in  this  way  he  continued  to  drive  a  flourishing  trade 
in  the  village  long  after  his  character  was  perfectly  well 
understood. 

Aside  from  the  tricks  of  his  own  trade,  Brother  Silas 
was  a  very  exemplary  man,  a  "  -professor  "  and  church 
member  in  good  and  regular  standing,  and  a  thorough 
teetotaler.  His  word  could  be  trusted  about  almost  any 
thing  except  a  horse.  He  knew  no  more  of  vain  and 
worldly  amusements  than  an  infant  in  arms.  He  was 
red-haired,  and  his  two  eyes  never  seemed  to  focus  prop- 


2*4  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

erly  ;  due,  I  suppose,  to  squinting  around  all  kinds  of 
horses  in  his  double-dealings.  When  he  came  to  visit 
Sister  Mariar  he  always  tilted  his  chair  back  against  the 
side  of  the  kitchen,  and  rested  his  head  upon  the  spot  it 
had  made  on  the  wall-paper  on  former  occasions.  After 
a  few  minutes  he  stealthily  took  out  his  jack-knife,  a 
huge,  murderous-looking  instrument  with  a  horn  handle, 
and  on  the  sly  began  to  cut  notches  in  the  edge  of 
Mariar's  old  wooden  kitchen  chair"  upon  which  he  was 
seated.  The  edge  of  the  chair-bottom  looked  like  a  fine- 
toothed  saw,  owing  to  the  little  bits  he  had  furtively  taken 
out  of  it  when  Mariar  was  not  looking.  She  never  ap 
peared  to  notice  the  way  Silas  carved  up  her  furniture, 
but  she  seldom  allowed  him  to  sit  in  the  parlor,  for  fear 
that  in  a  fit  of  absent-mindednes  he  might  begin  to  work 
on  the  mahogany. 

Silas  was  a  good  brother  and  an  affectionate  uncle,  if 
he  did  leave  his  mark  on  the  chairs.  Now,  when  Sissy  was 
brought  in  to  receive  his  admonitions  he  sat  tilted  back 
as  usual,  with  his  sanguinary-looking  jack-knife  in  his 
hand.  "  Why,  Sissy,"  he  began,  in  a  soft,  coaxing  voice, 
as  he  gazed  fondly  at  the  pretty  delinquent  before  him, 
"  I've  knowed  you  ever  sense  you  were  knee-high  to  a 
grasshopper.  I've  knowed  you  like  a  book,  Sissy,  and  I 
can't  believe  what  I've  heard  tell,  that  you  want  to  take  to 
play-actin',  Sissy.  It's  out  of  all  natur',  and  it's  ag'in' 
Scriptur'.  The  ministers  preach  ag'in'  play-actin'  regular 
as  they  do  ag'in'  intemperance.  There's  always  been 
horsemen  in  our  family  as  far  back  as  we've  knowed, 
but  there  never  was  a  play-actor.  We  take  as  natural  to 
the  horse  business  as  a  fish  takes  to  water  ;  but  as  to  this 
play-actin',  Sissy,  it  beats  all,  it  beats  all  ;  "  and  Silas, 
unable  to  express  the  enormity  of  his  niece's  turpitude, 
shut  his  eyes  and  leaned  back  against  the  wall,  with 
his  red  head  exactly  in  the  middle  of  the  spot  he  had 
made  on  the  paper. 


LADY  MACBETH.  215 

Sissy  looked  defiant  and  just  ready  to  cry.  She  was 
undeniably  pretty,  and  pouting  did  not  detract  from  her 
charms.  Silas  in  his  soft  heart  felt  the  penetrating  fem 
inine  influence.  He  could  not  be  harsh  with  Sissy.  He 
had  named  his  best  roan  colt  after  her  ;  how  could  he  ? 

"  It  all  comes  from  Aunt  Mariar,"  cried  Sissy,  breaking 
into  sobs.  "  She's  been  making  a  time  because  I  want  to 
— to — im-p-rove  myself  in  el-el-ocution." 

Mariar  was  already  in  tears,  with  her  apron  to  her 
eyes,  quite  oblivious  of  her  "vanities  and  falsities." 
"  You  don't  know  how  she's  carried  on,  Silas  ;  you  can't 
ever  imagine  ;  and  she  has  bewitched  Alick  with  this 
fool  business.  I  caught  her  twice  in  the  barn,  dressed  up 
in  a  pair  of  my  best  sheets,  acting  Lady  Macbeth.  She 
was  telling  Alick  to  stab  somebody,  and  I  thought  there 
would  be  bloody  murder." 

Silas  opened  his  eyes.  "  Lady  Macbeth  ?  Who  is  she, 
Mariar  ? " 

"  Why,  don't  you  know,  Silas  ?  " 

"  Oh,  yes,  of  course,"  Silas  replied  ;  though  he  had  not 
the  smallest  conception.  He  remembered  reading  of  a 
Kentucky  horse  named  Lady  Macbeth,  but  this  only 
served  to  muddle  his  brain  worse  than  ever. 

"  And  there's  that  Hamlet"  resumed  the  lamenting 
Mariar,  as  if  the  melancholy  Dane  were  an  obnoxious 
neighbor.  "  She's  filled  Alick's  head  with  him,  and  he 
goes  spouting  verses  all  over  the  house." 

Silas  was  terribly  befogged  in  regard  to  Hamlet,  but 
he  thought  it  best  not  to  say  any  thing  before  Sissy,  only 
he  opened  one  eye  and  shook  his  head  dismally,  at  the 
same  time  taking  a  furtive  notch  out  of  the  chair  and 
then  clicking  the  blade  of  his  knife  with  a  sharp  explosive 
noise.  "  Don't  give  way,  Mariar  ;  brace  up,"  he  did 
venture  to  remark  soothingly,  as  if  "  giving  way  "  re 
ferred  to  her  stays  or  possibly  to  some  part  of  her  bony 
structure, 


2l  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

But  Mariar  did  give  way,  and  quite  in  a  new  place. 
Seeing  Sissy  look  obdurate  and  hard,  she  broke  forth 
with  a  touch  of  spitefulness  Silas  could  not  approve. 

"  And  there's  Rufe  Clover — as  forehanded,  good-prin 
cipled  a  young  man  as  there  is  in  the  country.  She  has 
treated  Rufe  like  a  dog  ;  beckonin'  him  on,  then  shovin' 
him  off  at  her  pleasure — smilin'  and  frownin'  for  a  whole 
year ;  and  Rufe  is  sich  a  soft-hearted  fool  he  keeps  a  fol 
lowing  her,  whether  she  gives  him  a  cuff  or  a  pat  on  the 
head." 

"  Most  of  us  are  durned  fools  some  time  in  our  lives, 
Mariar.  Jest  so  with  horses.  The  stiddiest  of  them  will 
have  a  flounce  now  and  then.  I  wouldn't  give  a  red  con 
tinental  for  a  man  who  hadn't  made  a  fool  of  himself  once 
or  twice  in  his  life.  Wasn't  it  old  Solomon  as  said  there's 
a  time  for  every  man  to  make  a  fool  of  himself  ? " 

"  I  don't  take  no  stock  in  Solomon,"  remarked  Mrs. 
Mariar  gloomily. 

Sissy,  though  sulky  and  in  a  semi-showery  April-like 
condition,  looked  more  charming  than  ever,  and  Silas 
felt  his  heart  giving  way  under  the  influence  of  her 
beauty.  He  puckered  his  lips  to  whistle,  though  he 
made  no  sound,  and  occasionally  he  clicked  the  blade  of 
his  jack-knife  to  keep  himself  up  to  the  right  pitch  as  a 
moral  monitor. 

"  Well,"  said  Mrs.  Mariar,  breaking  silence,  "the  first 
thing  we  know  she  will  run  off  on  a  play-actin'  spree,  and 
like  as  not  she  will  take  Alick  with  her.  I  think  I  shall 
have  to  lock  her  up  for  a  few  days  in  the  store  chamber, 
until  she  gets  some  of  this  nonsense  out  of  her  head." 

"  No,  no,"  said  Uncle  Silas  deprecatingly.  "  Don't  do 
that.  Come  here,  Sissy,"  and  he  took  the  little,  soft, 
plump  hand  in  his  own  big  brown  one,  while  his  heart 
felt  ridiculously  weak.  "  Now,  Sissy,  you  ain't  agoin'  to  do 
any  thing  rash,  and  your  Aunt  Mariar  she  ain't  agoin'  to 
do  any  thing  ha'sh,  I  ain't  agoin'  to  do  any  thing  ha'sh 


MRS.    MARIAR  IN  HOT    WATER.  217 

either.  I'm  opposed  to  ha'shness.  I  always  say  you  can 
do  more  with  a  fractious  pony  by  rubbing  its  nose  and 
ears  than  you  can  by  pounding  its  back." 

A  smile  began  to  peep  out  of  Sissy's  bright  eyes,  and 
Silas  winked  back,  as  much  as  to  say,  "We  know  how  to 
manage  that  old  filly  Mariar,  excellent  old  creature  that 
she  is." 

"  We  ain't  going  to  tie  you  up  in  the  stall,"  Silas  re 
sumed,  "  or  hopple  you  with  a  log  of  wood,  or  any  thing 
of  the  kind.  We  are  jest  going  to  treat  you  kind  and 
give  you  your  six  quarts  of  oats  regular,  until  you  get 
over  this  play-actin'  nonsense,  and  treat  Rufe  Clover  as 
you  should." 

"  I  guess  Rufe  won't  suffer,"  said  Sissy,  with  a  pretty 
toss  of  her  head,  and  she  went  out  of  the  room. 

In  less  than  three  weeks  Mariar,  who,  as  Silas  said, 
was  by  nature  always  in  hot  water,  sent  over  in  great  dis 
tress  for  her  brother.  He  found  her,  like  a  female  Jere 
miah,  in  the  midst  of  lamentations.  Sissy  had  run  off 
sure  enough,  and  had  taken  Alick  with  her,  and  the 
house  was  in  a  terrible  state.  The  breakfast  things  were 
standing  on  the  table  in  the  middle  of  the  floor,  and  it 
was  past  three  in  the  afternoon.  Mrs.  Mariar  had  missed 
them  both  very  early  in  the  morning,  and  since  that  time 
she  had  enlisted  the  neighbors'  aid,  and  had  done  what 
she  could  to  get  on  the  track  of  the  fugitives  and  have 
them  brought  back.  Her  fears  of  late  had  been  much  al 
layed  by  the  constant  visits  of  young  Clover,  whose  affair 
with  Sissy  seemed  at  the  time  to  be  progressing  to  a 
happy  conclusion.  All  this  Silas  learned  between  floods 
of  tears  and  the  outpouring  of  a  torrent  of  reproaches  on 
his  own  head.  Poor  Silas  had  counseled  moderation  and 
gentleness,  and  now  see  what  had  come  of  it.  He  forgot 
even  to  take  his  accustomed  place  by  the  wall  or  to  get 
out  his  soothing  and  companionable  jack-knife. 

But  just  at  dark  a  neighbor  riding  by  brought  a  tele- 


2i8  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

gram  over  from  the  station.  It  read  thus  :  "  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Rufus  Clover  will  be  home  by  the  eight  o'clock 
train." 

"  I  vum,"  cried  Uncle  Silas,  starting  up  joyfully,  "  if 
she  ain't  gone  and  married  him  on  the  sly.  She  jest  did 
it  to  give  you  a  turn,  Mariar  ;  and  she  took  Alick  with 
her  as  a  blind.  The  plaguey  little  jade  !  She's  a  smart 
one,  Mariar.  Chain  lightnin'  ain't  nothin'  to  Sissy.  A 
colt  with  that  there  cunning  disposition  would  be  worth  a 
thousand  dollars.  Come  on,  Mariar,  let's  cut  a  pigeon- 
wing.  Were  both  of  us  *  professors  '  and  church  mem 
bers,  but  the  folks  will  never  know  it." 

When  the  newly-married  couple  arrived  the  first 
words  Rufus  Clover  said  were  :  "  Well,  Mrs.  Dalrymple, 
Sissy  made  me  run  away  with  her  and  get  married.  She 
said  she  would  not  have  me  otherwise." 

And  yet  I  don't  suppose  Sissy  had  ever  heard  of  Miss 
Lydia  Languish. 


CHAPTER     XXIV. 

SHIFTLESS  JABEZ. 

BURNT  PIGEON  is  a  semi-deserted  hamlet  a  few 
miles  from  the  village,  at  the  termination  of  one  of 
the  most  beautiful  drives  in  the  country.  The  road  ends 
there.  Civilization  ends  there.  It  is  the  jumping-off  place 
of  life,  enterprise,  and  good  living.  The  hamlet  clusters 
like  an  aggregation  of  cells  in  a  wasps'  nest  round  an  old 
abandoned  iron  mine.  At  one  time,  some  twenty-five  or 
thirty  years  ago,  it  was  thought  we  were  to  become  a  vast 
iron-producing  region,  and  visions  of  suddenly-acquired 
wealth  rose  before  the  minds  of  the  quiet  villagers.  Land 
rose  to  fabulous  prices  and  village  real  estate  was  quoted 
at  a  large  advance.  Misguided  people  dreamed  of  a  min 
iature  dingy,  smoky  Pittsburg  on  the  borders  of  our  lazy 
little  river.  But,  thank  heaven,  there  was  no  available 
water-power  for  smelting-furnaces  and  rolling-mills  ;  the 
ore  proved  very  stubborn  and  hard  to  work  ;  and  the  dis 
tance  from  a  large  market  rendered  its  transportation  too 
expensive  to  make  the  working  profitable.  So,  after  some 
years  of  experimenting,  after  digging  shafts,  and  throwing 
a  great  deal  of  money  into  them,  the  Burnt  Pigeon  mine 
and  Burnt  Pigeon  mining  village  were  abandoned  by  the 
owners,  and  we  shrank  back  into  our  native  blissful  state 
of  insignificance,  with  only  five  or  six  lines  in  the  ga 
zetteer. 

Why  the  mine  was  called  Burnt  Pigeon  nobody  knew. 
The  name  has  now  been  degraded  to  Pidgin.  After  the 
miners  went  away  their  miserable  houses  were  taken  in 
possession  of  vagrants  and  tramps,  those  loose  elements 


220  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

of  gipsydom,  which  gather  about  such  places  like  crows 
in  a  newly- planted  corn-field.  Occasionally  the  sheriff 
makes  a  raid  upon  Pidgin  to  look  for  a  stolen  horse,  or  a 
petty  thief,  but  though  the  hamlet  bears  rather  a  hard 
name,  being  lawless,  godless  and  schoolless,  like  all  such 
nests  of  wandering  folk,  the  truth  is,  that  the  Pidginites 
are  far  better  than  could  be  expected,  considering  the 
communal  freedom  they  enjoy.  Now  and  then  the  doc 
tor  or  minister  is  called  up  there — the  one  to  heal  the 
living,  the  other  to  bury  the  dead.  Some  religious  young 
men  in  the  village  tried  to  establish  a  Sunday-school  in 
Pidgin,  but  it  failed,  partly  because  the  population  is 
always  shifting,  and  partly  because  the  place  is  difficult 
of  access  in  bad  weather. 

The  road  which  runs  curving  about  the  mountain-flank 
washes  easily  in  heavy  storms,  owing  to  the  friable  nature 
of  the  soil  mixed  with  loose  stones.  There  are  several 
water-courses  and  small  cataracts  on  the  mountain-side, 
and  an  impetuous  thunder-shower  in  the  spring  or  autumn 
sets  them  foaming  and  tearing  down  into  the  valley,  up 
rooting  trees  and  moving  large  bowlders  in  their  course. 
Occasionally  in  the  winter,  Pidgin  has  been  literally  dug 
out  of  snow  banks  like  sheep  buried  in  the  Scotch  High 
lands.  The  wretched  handful  of  people  would  certainly 
suffer  for  food  at  times  if  some  of  the  men  were  not  skill 
ful  hunters,  very  successful  in  snaring  small  animals,  and 
in  fishing  in  the  remotest  brooks,  the  secret  of  whose 
wild  deep  trout-pools  is  known  only  to  themselves.  The 
road  to  Pidgin  gradually  lifts  you  up  to  a  higher  plane, 
the  air  becomes  sweeter,  the  sunlight  more  joyous  and 
youthful.  You  smell  the  sweet-fern  mingled  with  the  per 
fume  of  balsam,  and  up  and  up  you  go  until  you  feel  like 
a  fly  on  the  ceiling.  Great  hemlock  boughs  sweep  abruptly 
down  and  brush  across  the  wagon  top.  Giant  pines  arise 
with  their  columnar  stems  over  yellow  earth  carpets, 
framing  in  long  galleries  of  pictures.  YOU  hear  the  tink- 


ODD   NAMES  OF  PIDGINITES.  22t 

ling  of  cow-bells  just  below  you.  The  grass  meadows  are 
so  close  to  the  base  of  the  hill  their  perfume  comes  floating 
up  the  wall  of  rocks.  Large  bowlders  beautifully  colored 
and  moss-grown,  lie  close  to  the  steep  descent,  and  be 
tween  them  grow  juniper  bushes,  sassafras  trees,  arbor 
vitae,  bunches  of  feather-fern,  wild  raspberry  and  black 
berry  bushes,  the  wild  honeysuckle  and  azalea,  and  great 
colonies  of  hedge-roses.  The  whole  road,  all  the  way  up, 
to  Pidgin,  is  bordered  by  a  natural  garden,  with  here  and 
there  a  gadding  grape-vine,  which  clambers  into  a  tree  to 
make  the  picture  more  like  the  Italian  Apennines. 

Probably  the  doctor  knows  more  about  the  ways  of  life 
at  Pidgin  than  any  one  else.  Children  are  born  up  there 
occasionally,  and  several  of  them  have  been  named  John 
Rivington,  much  to  the  amusement  of  the  doctor's  friends. 
The  name  is  generally  sandwiched  in  between  others 
more  or  less  high-sounding  and  absurd.  The  so-called 
Christian  names  of  the  Pidginites  are  among  the  stock 
stories  the  village  people  always  tell  to  strangers.  One 
of  the  girls  up  there  is  simply  called  Queen  Victoria 
Columbia  Alleluia — the  last  name  not  given  from  irrever 
ence,  but  from  sheer  ignorance.  Another  child  is  doomed 
to  bear  about  with  her  the  heavy  weight  of  Guy  Fawkes 
Dunleath  Howard  Sarsaparilla  Jones.  Where  Guy 
Fawkes  was  picked  up  it  is  impossible  to  say.  A  boy, 
in  the  fervor  of  patriotism,  is  entitled  Brave  Gen.  Grant, 
William  T.  Sherman  Fish.  To  each  one  of  his  name 
sakes  the  doctor  presents  a  Bible,  with  name  inscribed 
on  the  fly-leaf,  and  a  small  sum  of  money.  It  is  known 
that  he  buys  the  Bibles  by  the  dozen  of  the  American 
Bible  Society,  and  of  late  he  has  taken  to  giving  out  the 
new  version,  as  he  wishes  the  little  John  Rivingtons  to 
be  brought  up  on  the  pure  milk  of  the  Word. 

Last  year  the  doctor  was  selectman,  and  he  had  his 
eye  severely  on  all  tramps,  beggars,  disreputable  and 
lawless  persons.  The  mixture  of  hardness  and  tender- 


fee*  right,  cv  allow  aaj  miscreant  to  go 

::t,  :  _:  it  —  ..  ri^:t  ii-  .^.  ;r_r:     .:: 


i.~    i:    i    :n-    r^    rut 


j.    "      j.  I       ~"  ^  • 

cad,  sat  a  lean, 

-i.  i-i    -i  :  x 


7    rf 


iblcd  with  a  hoUov  coogii.    .A.  haodkcfciiicf 

:  :r:  r.t.ii.  iri  ::;-   :^e  -17  it:  ;•:•::  : 
i:    _:  it:  ft-t:  .:   ~^   r~.iti:  ::i:  sir  ri 


itii  ::  i 

Br  the  wtman's  side 


"  THE  FOLKS    TOOK  A   PREJUDICE"  -^5 

dies  of  sticks.  Her  bare  feet  made  splashes  in  the  soft 
dirt  of  the  road,  with  ten  little  depressions  for  the  toes. 
She  carried  a  black  and  white  kitten,  held  with  a  nervous 
grasp  in  her  bony  arms. 

The  doctor  jumped  out  of  his  wagon,  at  the  risk  of 
hurting  his  rheumatic  knee.  The  sight  of  this  family  on 
the  road,  moving  with  the  whole  of  their  earthly  posses 
sions,  gave  him  a  sensation  like  nostalgia.  He  wanted  to 
pull  that  man  off  the  load  and  thrash  him  within  an  inch 
of  his  life  for  allowing  the  sick  woman  to  walk  and  carry 
her  baby.  But  the  doctor  restrained  himself,  and  the 
man  at  sight  of  him  began  to  duck  as  if  with  .the  intent 
of  putting  up  an  umbrella  to  screen  himself  from  the 
storm  of  wrath  he  felt  was  about  to  descend  on  his  devoted 
head. 

"  What  are  you  about  ?  "  said  the  doctor  sternly,  as  he 
stood  in  the  road,  his  long  carriage  whip  in  his  hand, 
while  the  woman  looked  up  in  his  face  with  her  wear}7 
lack-luster  eyes. 

"  Wai,  you  see,  we  had  ter  move.  The  folks  up  thar 
kinder  took  a  prejudice,  and  they  lent  me  a  hoss  and 
wagon  to  move  my  stuff." 

"  Oh,  they  made  you  clear  out,  did  they  ? "  returned 
the  doctor,  while  a  grim  smile  spread  over  his  face.  It 
tickled  him  to  think  there  was  some  righteous  wrath  up 
in  Pidgin,  and  almost  restored  him  to  good  humor. 

"  Yes,  I  b'l'eve  they  did.  I  don't  know  why.  I  was 
allus  peaceable,  me  and  my  folks.  I  hain't  no  idea  why 
they  took  a  prejudice,"  he  went  on  in  a  whining  tone. 
"  But  they  did,  and  they  hinted  at  tar  and  feathers." 

The  sunshine  of  laughter  spread  over  the  doctor's 
face.  Really  there  is  balm  in  Gilead,  there  is  hope  for 
Pidgin,  he  thought.  "  Do  you  think  the  village  folks 
will  like  to  have  you  quartered  on  them  any  better  than 
they  liked  it  up  in  Pidgin  ?  Do  you  expect  to  go  to  the 
poor-house  ? " 


224  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

The  man  lifted  the  edge  of  his  rimless  hat,  and 
scratched  his  head.  "  I  'low  not.  There's  that  old 
house  off  the  turnpike  in  the  woods  they  call  haunted. 
I  ain't  afeared  of  ghosts,  and  I  thought  I'd  move  my 
folks  in  there  until  I  could  get  in  better  shape.  Hayin' 
is  coming  along,  and  I  'low  I  can  get  a  job  of  work  then  ; 
and  there's  my  wife  and  the  girl,  they  can  pick  berries  at 
odd  times." 

"  We  don't  propose  to  harbor  vagrants,"  said  the 
doctor  sternly.  "  I  know  you  won't  work.  You  are 
a  perfectly  hopeless  case.  If  I  had  my  way,  there  would 
be  a  whipping-post  set  up  for  just  such  louts  as  you 
are." 

The  man  looked  down  and  wiped  his  face  on  the 
sleeve  of  his  ragged  shirt.  "  I  ain't  no  vagrom,  and  I 
don't  propose  to  beg.  And  I  know  you  can't  jug  me 
unless  I  do  suthin'  ag'in'  the  law." 

The  doctor  knew  it  too,  and  at  that  moment  he  caught 
sight  of  the  woman's  white  face,  the  baby  that  had  gone 
to  sleep  on  her  shoulder,  and  the  great  eyes  of  the  child 
fixed  on  his  face. 

"  Here."  said  he,  half  jerking  the  man  out  of  the 
wagon.  "  Now  put  your  wife  and  baby  in  there,  and  do 
you  take  those  reins  and  walk  alongside,  and  guide  the 
horse."  He  helped  the  poor  woman  up  to  the  seat  on 
the  bottom  of  the  wash-tub,  and  lifted  in  the  little  girl, 
who  was  painfully  light — like  a  bundle  of  hollow  bird's 
bones — and  then  he  stood  and  watched  as  the  load 
moved  down  the  road,  swaying  from  side  to  side,  the 
man  shuffling  along  in  his  old  slippers. 

The  haunted  house  in  the  woods  off  the  turnpike  had 
long  been  an  object  of  intense  awe  and  curiosity  to  the 
village  children.  It  had  lost  its  doors  and  windows  and 
part  of  its  walls,  and  was  in  a  ruinous  condition.  The 
plaster  had  dropped  from  the  ceilings,  and  a  rickety 
stairway  led  to  a  dilapidated  chamber,  where,  it  was  said, 


A  V  OPEN-  WORK  HO  USE .  225 

spots  of  blood  could  be  seen  on  the  floor.  As  the  legend 
of  the  house  ran,  a  peddler  had  been  murdered  in  that 
room,  and  nightly  came  back  in  search  of  his  pack  and  a 
bag  of  gold.  When  the  nomad  Jabez  and  his  family 
took  up  their  abode  in  this  old  shell  of  a  house,  the  chil 
dren  all  rushed  over  to  see  how  a  family  looked  living 
without  any  front  door  or  glass  windows.  Their  do 
mestic  life  certainly  had  a  very  open  expression,  and  for 
a  time  the  fascination  of  watching  what  went  on  in  the 
very  inside  of  the  Jabez  household,  where  a  ghost  was 
supposed  to  be  one  of  the  inmates,  kept  the  children 
glued  to  the  spot. 

Jabez  meantime  would  stand  in  the  doorless  doorway, 
his  ragged  nether  garment  held  up  by  a  tow  string,  and 
monotonously  reprobate  their  presence.  Mrs.  Jabez, 
poor  soul,  did  what  she  could  in  that  dreadful  open-work 
house  by  pinning  up  newspapers  and  hanging  the  only 
pair  of  sheets  she  possessed  at  some  of  the  orifices  to 
secure  a  little  privacy.  In  a  few  days  Jabez  put  out  a 
shingle  sign  :  "  Ginger  Pop  and  Spruce  Gum  sold  here. 
Also  Ginseng  and  Pepper  root."  He  gave  it  out  that  he 
was  busily  engaged  in  searching  the  woods  for  roots  and 
herbs,  and  intended  to  invent  a  patent  medicine  and  call 
it  the  Jabez  Elixir  of  Life.  But  his  wares  were  all  frauds. 
The  boys  who  invested  a  portion  of  their  pocket  money 
in  his  ginger  pop  found  it  was  nothing  but  colored  water, 
and  the  spruce  gum  was  in  no  way  chewable.  They 
threatened  to  mob  him  if  he  did  not  take  down  his  shingle, 
and  Jabez,  the  victim  of  circumstances,  was  forced  to 
withdraw  from  mercantile  life.  But  the  boys  did  not 
cease  their  persecutions.  They  crept  round  to  the  rear 
of  the  ruinous  cottage  where  Mrs.  Jabez  had  left  things 
all  open  to  the  universe,  and  there  they  made  remarks  on 
what  the  Jabez  family  had  for  dinner  and  supper,  and 
watched  the  whole  of  the  internal  domestic  economy  as  if 
it  had  been  an  absorbing  play.  This  continued  until  the 


226  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

village  schoolmaster  came  out,  clothed  with  authority, 
and  drove  the  boys  home  at  the  point  of  a  sharp 
stick. ' 

Meanwhile  the  burden  of  feeding  the  family  in  a  man 
ner,  however  inadequate,  fell  almost  entirely  on  the  little 
ten-year-old  girl.  She  was  known  in  the  village  as  the 
chippie  bird,  because  she  was  so  slender  and  light  ;  she 
could  creep  through  the  smallest  opening  in  a  hedge,  and 
almost  seemed  to  fly  over  stone  walls  and  fences.  Chip 
pie  had  that  indefatigable  energy  possessed  by  some 
nervous  children,  and  a  most  patient,  angelic  temper. 
She  performed  the  labor  of  a  girl  twice  her  years,  and 
never  complained  of  being  tired.  She  collected  sticks  in 
the  woods  and  carried  great  bundles  to  furnish  fuel  for 
the  fire.  She  pulled  greens  in  the  meadows  and  gath 
ered  wild  berries  for  miles  around  to  sell  in  the  village 
from  door  to  door.  It  seemed  as  if  the  little  creature 
never  rested  day  or  night,  and  her  brown  legs,  and  feet, 
and  hands  were  cruelly  torn  by  the  brambles.  When  the 
mother  was  ill,  and  she  was  always  ailing,  Chippie  took 
care  of  her  nights,  tended  the  baby,  and  cooked  such 
food  as  she  could  procure. 

The  village  people  soon  came  to  recognize  the  rare 
spirit  of  the  child.  Her  wonderful  old  eyes  troubled 
them  and  touched  their  hearts.  They  gave  her  more 
than  conscience  warranted,  knowing  it  would  go  to  feed 
lazy  Jabez.  They  took  her  into  their  houses  and  fed  and 
dressed  her,  but  in  a  few  days  she  appeared  again  in  the 
old  rags.  Where  the  good  clothes  went  to  they  never 
knew,  but  it  was  conjectured  that  Jabez  sold  them  to  pro 
cure  tobacco  and  whisky.  He  was  known  to  have  taken 
his  wife's  strengthening  medicine  for  the  sake  of  the  spir 
its  it  was  put  up  in.  The  doctor  would  have  given  a 
considerable  sum  of  money  to  rid  the  neighborhood  of 
Jabez,  in  such  a  humane  and  perfectly  satisfactory  man 
ner  that  he  need  never  think  of  him  again.  He  offered  to 


' '  COMP  UL  SILATORY"   ED  UCA  TION.  227 

take  the  little  girl  and  find  her  a  good  home,  and  have 
her  taught,  but  the  father  refused. 

"  What's  the  use  of  bringin'  up  children,"  said  Jabez 
argumentatively,  "  and  havin'  all  the  worry,  and  fret,  and 
bother,  if  they  don't  help  their  payrents  when  they  are 
weakly  and  unable  to  help  themselves  ?  You  folks  can't 
have  that  little  gal  nohow.  I'm  an  affectionate  father, 
and  I  should  be  pinin'  for  her  society.  No  use  talkin', 
you  can't  have  my  gal." 

When  the  cold  autumn  weather  began  to  pinch  the 
inmates  of  the  doorless  and  windowless  house,  and  there 
were  no  berries  or  wild  fruits  to  gather,  and  the  grain 
fields  and  apple  orchards  had  been  pretty  thoroughly 
gleaned,  Jabez  grew  very  fretful  and  morose.  He  raised 
his  hand  against  his  miserable  consumptive  wife,  and  the 
village  officials  warned  him  that  they  would  lock  him  up 
in  jail  if  he  did  not  behave  better.  He  was  worse  than  a 
pest  in  the  neighborhood,  and  pity  for  his  wretched  family 
made  it  all  the  harder  for  charitable  folks  who  could  not 
in  conscience  feed  and  comfort  this  miserable  shiftless 
being.  One  day  Chippie  came  home  from  a  foraging  ex 
pedition  looking  quite  blue  down  to  the  tips  of  her 
pathetic  little  toes.  "  The  doctor  says  I  must  go  to 
school,"  she  began  in  her  piping,  childish  treble.  "  He 
says  its  compulsilatory,  that's  just  the  word  he  used  ;  and 
I  must  have  a  new  frock  and  a  pair  of  shoes." 

"  Compulsilatory  !  "  repeated  Jabez,  as  he  lay  half 
stretched  out  on  a  truckle-bed  in  one  corner  of  the  room. 
"  I  don't  approve  of  this  community  at  all.  It's  the 
meanest  place  I  ever  got  into.  There  ain't  no  fishin'  and 
there  ain't  no  huntin',"  he  went  on  bitterly,  as  if  nature 
had  contrived  the  deficiency  especially  to  spite  him. 
"  Leastways  if  there  was  huntin',  I  couldn't  hunt,  cos  I 
hain't  no  gun.  There  ain't  no  whisky  .to  be  had  nuther. 
When  a  man  feels  weak  and  all  gone,  a  thimbleful  of 
whisky  sets  him  up  amazing.  Wrife,  we  shall  have  to 


228  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

move  on  to  the  pine  barrens,  where  there  ain't  no  talk 
about  this  compulsilatory  eddication — takin'  a  man's  chil 
dren  away  from  him  and  shuttin'  of  'em  up  in  a  school- 
hus'  when  he  needs  them  as  a  prop  and  a  stay  in  time  of 
trouble.  We  will  pack  up  to-murrur  and  be  off,  and  then 
where  will  their  compulsilatory  eddication  be  ?  Farmer 
White  said  he'd  let  me  take  his  wagon  to  move  any  time 
and  glad  to  do  it." 

The  next  day,  when  all  the  wretched  Jabez  household 
was  packed  into  Farmer  White's  wagon,  some  one  asked 
Jabez  what  there  was  to  live  on  in  the  barrens  and  what 
he  expected  to  do  there. 

"  Dunno,"  said  he,  scratching  his  head,  "  what  I  shall 
do,  and  dunno  what  there  is  to  live  on  in  the  barrens  un 
less  it  is  turpentine.  And  turpentine  for  a  stiddy  thing 
is  better  than  nothin'." 


CHAPTER  XXV. 

CUPID  AMONG  JUNE  ROSES.     THE  LITTLE  MAIDEN  SISTERS. 

THE  rose  season  brings  with  it  every  thing  beautiful. 
To  Italy  it  brings  the  nightingale,  to  Persia  the 
bulbul.  But  as  we  can  have  neither  nightingale  nor  bul- 
bul,  we  must  content  ourselves  with  the  bobolink,  the 
robin,  the  cat-bird,  the  song-sparro\v,  and  the  evening 
thrush.  The  meadows  are  in  their  glory.  Some  hillsides 
have  a  milky  froth  of  ox-eye  daisies  which  the  farmers 
behold  with  displeasure,  while  young  girls  gather  them  in 
great  clusters  to  deck  the  bodice.  The  timothy  and 
herdsgrass  have  gathered  a  delicate  pinkish  dust  of  flow 
ers.  The  clover  is  rounded  to  a  crimson  globe,  inviting 
the  bee.  It  is  a  time  of  enchantment,  when  young  hearts 
and  simple  unworldly  old  hearts  think  of  love,  the  adjust 
ment  of  the  inner  world  to  the  outer  vision. 

Roses,  new-mown  hay,  honeysuckle,  and  strawberries 
are  associated  in  one's  thoughts  with  wedding  bells,  wed 
ding  favors,  bride-cake,  and  happy  pairs  whirled  off  into 
the  blissful  honeymoon.  We  have  had  our  village  wed 
dings.  They  have  been  rather  frequent  this  year  for  a 
community  not  much  given  to  matrimony,  and  now  that 
they  are  all  over  we  regret  that  we  must  settle  down  to 
the  prosaic  hum-drum  of  ordinary  life.  The  wedding  of 
Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman  and  Miss  Busy  Bee  was  of  the 
purely  conventional  sort.  The  village  church  was  hand 
somely  trimmed  with  palms  and  exotics,  and  there  was  a 
great  abundance  of  white  satin,  tulle,  and  orange  blos 
soms.  The  town  was  filled  with  the  bustle  of  visitors 
who  came  from  a  distance  ;  and  our  village  paper  devoted 
two  or  three  columns  of  its  valuable  space  to  a  descrip- 


230  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

tion  of  the  trousseau  and  the  wedding  gifts.  Hugh 
cheerfully  acted  as  best  man  to  show  that  he  had  no 
grudge  against  the  lady  for  taking  a  richer  lover  and 
slighting  him.  Mr.  Wiseman's  house  would  now  be  one 
of  the  most  agreeable  in  the  village.  He  could  not  afford 
to  be  on  bad  terms  with  the  pretty  young  mistress.  The 
groom  slipped  a  wedding  fee  of  a  hundred  dollars  into 
the  parson's  hand,  and,  soon  after,  our  young  clergyman's 
wife  appeared  in  a  new  black  silk  gown,  which  became 
her  amazingly.  Mr.  Wiseman's  old  housekeeper  sat  in  a 
back  pew  crying  and  sobbing  during  the  entire  ceremony, 
but  when  the  happy  pair  drove  off  amid  a  shower  of  rice 
and  old  slippers,  she  sent  a  pair  of  her  old  shoes  (number 
tens)  flying  after  them  for  luck,  and  raised  a  shout  of 
laughter. 

But  Mr.  Milletseed  and  Miss  Rose  Madder  could  not 
think  of  being  married  in  that  style,  which  they  consid 
ered  horribly  ugly  and  inartistic.  They  were  wedded 
under  a  blooming  apple  tree,  which  made  a  pretty  bower 
for  their  young  heads.  Rose  was  clad  in  artless  Swiss 
muslin  made  rather  scant,  and  tied  about  the  waist  with 
a  white  satin  sash.  She  wore  a  high  shepherdess  hat, 
trimmed  with  a  great  deal  of  fluffy  white  lace,  and  she 
hoped  she  looked  sufficiently  like  a  WThistler  or  a  Burne- 
Jones  to  be  aesthetically  interesting.  Milletseed  had  pro 
cured  a  new  velvet  coat  for  the  occasion,  and  was  married 
in  knee  breeches  and  buckled  shoes.  He  was  a  Walter 
Crane  all  over.  The  artists  and  students  who  had  come 
up  from  the  city  danced  about  the  apple  tree,  and  poured 
libations  to  Hymen  and  sang  French  love  songs.  When 
the  young  couple  went  away  so  poor  and  so  happy,  with 
the  future  an  unknown  x  or  y  in  their  reckoning,  a  great 
many  tender  good  wishes,  like  a  flock  of  doves,  flew  after 
them,  and  a  few  sentimental  old  maids  shed  tears  because 
they  looked  so  young  and  so  little  able  to  cope  with  the 
hard  facts  of  life. 


DRUSILLA' S  NUPTIALS.  231 

The  nuptials  of  Drusilla  took  place  at  home,  in  the 
great  drawing-room,  where  a  wealthy  ancestor  had  form 
erly  given  fine  banquets.  It  is  one  of  those  handsome 
old  colonial  rooms,  white  and  gold,  with  a  great  tiled  fire 
place  and  high  chimney-piece,  which  modern  decorative 
taste  has  again  brought  into  vogue.  There  are  two  white 
and  gold  pillars  at  the  east  end  of  the  room  framing  a 
mullioned  window.  Drusilla's  friends  wished  to  adorn 
these  pillars  with  vines  and  flowers,  to  make  a  kind  of 
bower  where  she  and  the  Rev.  Arthur  Meeker  were  to 
stand.  But  Drusilla  would  not  hear  to  such  nonsense. 
She  allowed  only  two  large  clusters  of  red  and  white  roses 
to  be  placed  in  the  tall  blue  china  jars  on  the  hearth  by 
the  great  chimney-piece.  Neither  would  she  have  the 
new-fangled  marriage  ceremony  with  a  ring  taken  from 
the  Episcopal  Service-Book.  She  insisted  on  being  mar 
ried  in  the  plainest  way.  There  was  not  even  a  bride 
cake.  Her  idea  was  just  to  stand  up  and  have  it  over 
with  as  quickly  as  possible.  But  a  few  friends  would 
come  in,  and  our  old  St.  Patty  was  brought  down  in  her 
invalid  chair  and  ensconced  in  the  place  of  honor.  She 
was  dressed  by  her  friends  and  lovers  in  her  tabbinet 
gown,  and  those  dainty  laces  and  clear-starched  muslins 
which  became  her  so  well.  She  allowed  the  girls  to  pin 
white  flowers  in  her  cap  and  in  the  breast  of  her  gown, 
and  though  nearly  a  hundred  years  old,  she  looked  much 
more  like  a  bride  than  her  matter-of-fact,  strong-minded 
daughter. 

Drusilla  was  married  in  a  good  stout  serviceable  travel 
ing  dress  of  a  color  that  would  not  show  dust.  She  wore 
a  bonnet  and  gloves  of  the  same  hue,  and  her  air  was 
prompt  and  business-like.  It  had  taken  considerable 
energy  to  get  the  Rev.  Arthur  Meeker  in  trim  for  the 
wedding  journey.  It  was  necessary  to  brace  him  up  with 
two  eggs  beaten  in  half-a-tumbler  of  sherry.  He  was 
obliged  to  wear  a  mustard  paste  on  his  chest  during  the 


232  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

ceremony,  and  was  well  padded  all  over  with  new  and 
thick  red  flannels,  which  Drusillahad  selected  for  his  use. 
It  seemed  cruel  to  pelt  so  frail  a  person  even  with  rice, 
and  this  ceremony  was  omitted  by  request.  When  the 
newly  married  pair  went  to  the  carriage,  which  was  in 
waiting  to  take  them  to  the  station,  the  Rev.  Arthur  car 
ried  a  light  summer  shawl  for  his  wife's  use  over  his  left 
arm.  But  she  came  loaded  down  with  his  two  coats,  a 
pair  of  umbrellas,  a  walking-stick,  a  hot-water  bottle,  and 
a  flask  of  new  milk.  It  was  a  significant  symbol  of  the 
respective  burdens  they  would  bear  through  life.  The 
people  tried  to  hide  their  smiles  while  they  whispered  to 
each  other  that  Drusilla  had  at  last  got  her  hands  full. 
But  it  was  what  she  had  married  for.  She  had  taken 
him  up  as  a  vocation — a  home-mission  enterprise — and 
although  he  was  a  smaller  one  than  her  natural  ambition 
would  have  chosen,  he  was  better  than  nothing. 

In  a  small  community  weddings  leave  a  ripple  of 
excited  feeling  behind  them,  and  stir  up  the  feminine 
fancy  with  new  and  pleasing  hopes.  After  Drusilla  went 
off,  "  at  her  age,"  all  the  single  sisters  looked  in  the  glass 
with  a  certain  feeling  of  encouragement.  It  might  not 
be  too  late  after  all,  and  small  flutteringsof  pleased  antic 
ipation  lent  a  vague  charm  to  the  summer  days.  As  for 
the  young  girls,  their  innocent  hearts  were  filled  with  the 
cooing  and  soft  twitterings  of  the  dove  of  promise  ;  and 
the  young  men's  eyes  sought  theirs  with  new  meanings, 
and  blushes  came  more  readily  than  their  wont.  Even 
the  most  wooden  of  the  old  bachelors  felt  growing  pains 
and  slight  twinges  of  romantic  impulse,  as  if  their  sober 
affections  might  yet  put  forth  new  shoots,  and  the  Indian 
summer  bring  a  blessing  they  had  missed  in  the  spring. 

The  two  maiden  sisters,  who  live  in  the  cottage  nearly 
opposite  the  great  gate  of  Judge  Magnus's  mansion, 
under  one  of  the  largest  elm  trees  in  the  village  street, 
belong  to  those  tender  souls  who,  though  unwed,  never 


MfSS  HENRIETTE   AND  MISS  SOPHIE.         233 

pass  the  prime  of  romantic  sentiment,  sacred  to  love's 
illusions.  They  are  small  women,  who  have  gone  off  a 
good  deal  in  figure  with  the  advance  in  years,  and  they 
both  have  the  same  curious  little  stoop  of  the  shoulders 
and  the  same  way  of  wearing  the  hair,  with  feeble 
attempts  at  girlish  curls  and  frizzes  straying  out  from 
under  their  black  head-dresses.  Miss  Henriette  is  sup 
posed  to  be  very  lively  and  waggish,  while  Miss  Sophie 
is  more  serious  in  her  cast  of  mind,  and  occasionally 
writes  poetry  as  a  pastime.  They  are  both  as  innocent 
as  babes,  though  they  imagine  they  know  •  a  great  deal 
about  the  wickedness  of  the  world.  They  are  apt  to 
think  the  same  thoughts,  and  speak  the  same  words 
simultaneously  ;  and  when  the  lively  Henriette  leads  the 
conversation  Sophie  nods  and  smiles  approval,  and 
repeats  after  her  the  end  of  each  sentence. 

The  little  sisters  take  great  care  of  their  health,  and 
have  a  number  of  pet  diseases,  of  which  they  are  as 
proud  as  if  they  were  rare  plants  or  vines.  They  are 
homoeopaths  on  principle  ;  but  when  they  are  seriously 
ill  the  doctor  comes  in  unbidden,  throws  the  little  pills 
and  mixtures  with  which  they  are  continually  dosing 
themselves  out  of  the  window,  and  treats  them  as  he 
pleases.  Strange  to  say,  the  little  sisters  are  hardly  ever 
ill  one  at  a  time.  If  one  takes  to  her  bed,  the  other  is 
sure  to  follow  very  soon.  They  have  lived  so  long 
together,  they  have  the  same  motions,  the  same  sensa 
tions.  If  one  feels  a  twinge  in  her  right  thumb,  the 
other  feels  it  in  exactly  the  same  place.  The  only  differ 
ence  is  that  Henriette  sometimes  sees  a  joke  when 
Sophie  does"  not  see  it,  and  then  she  has  to  make  an 
elaborate  dissection  of  the  joke  for  Sophie,  which  is  very 
trying  to  a  humorist. 

When  they  go  to  church  on  fine  Sundays  their  old  fat 
tabby  cat  always  follows  them  like  an  enchanted  maid, 
and  waits  outside  the  sanctuary  until  they  emerge. 


234  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

Every  boy  in  the  village  knows  this  old  tabby,  and  a 
youngster  who  should  venture  to  shy  a  stone  at  her 
would  be  considered  hopelessly  depraved  by  the  whole 
community.  They  have  two  canary  birds  which  make  a 
music-box  of  their  little  cottage  ;  and  as  seems  perfectly 
right  and  natural,  Henriette's  is  a  livelier  and  sprightlier 
bird  than  Sophie's.  The  little  sisters  are  certainly  poor, 
and  for  many  years  their  frugal  housekeeping  has  been 
helped  out  by  the  gifts  of  kind  friends.  All  sorts  of  fic 
tions  are  devised  to  make  the  delicate,  refined  old 
women  believe  they  are  not  objects  of  charity,  but,  as 
some  one  has  well  said,  objects  of  amity.  It  would  hurt 
their  sensibilities  to  discover  that  their  small  economies 
are  known  to  the  neighbors — the  fact  that  the  old  gowns 
are  turned  and  turned,  and  dyed  with  their  own  hands, 
to  look  perfectly  ladylike  and  respectable.  When  the 
judge's  wife  comes  home  from  Washington,  she  brings 
them  little  gifts  ;  and  at  Christmas,  of  course,  presents 
are  allowable.  The  kind  farmers  are  always  asking  them 
to  taste  their  vegetables  and  fruits,  their  butter  and  eggs  ; 
their  wood  is  mysteriously  laid  in  for  them  when  they  go 
away  on  visits.  Some  one  for  ten  years  past  has  regu 
larly  paid  their  tax  bill,  and  although  it  is  an  open  secret 
in  the  village,  they  have  never  been  able  to  discover  their 
benefactor.  Thus  they  are  kept  in  perfect  comfort, 
while  the  fiction  of  their  independence  is  maintained. 

They  take  the  most  innocent  lively  interest  in  the 
affairs  of  the  neighborhood.  They  are  fond  of  gossip, 
especially  the  love  stories,  but  they  are  free  from  malice 
and  most  ingenious  in  finding  out  the  good  points  of 
people  generally  considered  immoral  and'  worthless. 
When  a  villager  is  caught  in  any  overt  act  of  wickedness 
which  appears  to  admit  of  no  excuse,  the  neighbors  are 
always  eager  to  hear  what  the  little  sisters  will  say  about 
him,  in  what  good  quality  their  charitable  souls  will  take 
refuge  from  the  general  turpitude  of  the  delinquent.  The 


HAXK  HA  YRICK.  235 

country-side  has  its  myths  and  legends,  and  one  of  the 
most  frightful  of  these  clings  to  a  notorious  character, 
Hank  Hayrick  by  name,  who  over  twenty  years  ago  kept 
a  low  tavern  on  the  side  of  Saddleback.  Hank  was  a 
hard  drinker  and  very  quarrelsome  and  profane  in  his 
cups.  During  the  war  of  the  Rebellion  he  was  a  blatant, 
shameless  secessionist  and  copperhead  ;  and  in  the  midst 
of  a  most  loyal  community  was  considered  a  standing 
disgrace  and  infamy.  At  the  time  of  President  Lincoln's 
assassination,  so  the  story  runs,  Hank  openly  rejoiced, 
loudly  declaring  his  gladness.  For  three  days  he  held 
an  orgie  with  his  boon  companions  on  the  mountain, 
drinking  and  carousing,  and  uttering  horrible  blasphem 
ies.  The  road  from  Hank's  house  leading  down  the 
mountain,  is  steep  and  dangerous,  as  for  more  than  a 
mile  it  flanks  an  abrupt  precipice,  along  which  some 
brush  and  trunks  of  trees  have  been  thrown  as  a  slight 
guard.  In  the  spring  the  danger  is  much  increased  by 
ice  and  washouts.  Hank,  in  the  afternoon  of  the  third 
day,  while  still  under  the  influence  of  drink,  started  with 
a  pair  of  half-broken  colts  to  drive  down  the  mountain, 
the  road  being  in  very  bad  condition.  As  he  Was 
alone,  it  was  never  known  just  how  the  accident  occurred, 
but  at  night  he  was  found  at  the  bottom  of  a  gorge  a 
hundred  feet  deep,  he  and  his  horses  stark  dead. 

When  this  dreadful  story  was  told  to  the  little  sisters 
they  sat  in  pained  silence  for  some  time.  They  had  been 
crying  over  the  death  of  the  good  president,  and  their 
eyes  were  red  and  swollen.  "  Well,"  said  Sophie  at  last, 
with  a  great  sigh,  "  I  often  and  often  saw  Hank  Hayrick 
drive  past  here.  He  may  have  been  a  dreadful  wicked 
bad  man,  but  I  never  saw  him  no  ways  intoxicated.  He 
always  sat  up  straight  in  his  wagon  and  managed  his 
horses  well.  And  once  when  sister  Henriette  was  trying 
to  pick  her  way  across  the  street  in  a  muddy  time  he 
stopped  to  let  her  get  past  without  spattering  of  her," 


236  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

"So  he  did,"  said  Henrietta,  brightening  up  wonderfully. 
"  I  am  so  glad  you  remembered  that,  sister." 

The  little  sisters  cherish  the  harmless  fiction  that  if 
they  had  not  been  so  devoted  to  each  other,  they  might 
have  married.  But  they  never  could  bear  the  idea  of 
living  separated.  Perhaps  no  one  ever  asked  them  in 
marriage,  but  that  makes  no  difference.  The  small  speck 
of  possible  romance  keeps  their  hearts  soft  and  young. 
Of  course,  they  know  it  is  too  late  to  think  of  such  things 
for  themselves  now.  But  they  can  enter  into  other  lives 
and  sympathize  with  all  lovers  most  truly.  Within  a  year 
a  distant  relative  has  come  to  pass  some  time  with  them. 
She  is  considerably  younger  than  either  Henriette  or 
Sophie,  but  still  she  is  a  spinster  pretty  well  advanced  in 
years.  The  little  sisters  regard  her  as  a  great  deal 
younger  than  themselves,  indeed,  quite  a  young  person, 
and  on  the  score  of  her  youth  would  excuse  any  folly  or 
indiscretion  she  might  commit. 

The  sisters  have  woven  a  little  romance  about  their 
friend  from  the  fact  of  her  once  having  been  partly  in 
love  with  a  young  man  who  paid  her  a  great  deal  of  atten 
tion  and  then  went  off  and  married  her  most  intimate 
friend.  It  would  appear  that  the  young  man  had  been  so 
very  attentive  because  he  wished  to  talk  about  her  friend, 
the  lady  with  whom  he  was  in  love  ;  but  in  the  eyes  of 
the  little  sisters  his  conduct  is  none  the  less  reprehensible. 
They  could  find  excuses  for  Hank  Hayrick  sooner  than 
for  "  that  man,"  as  they  always  call  him.  Miss  Crayshaw 
dresses  nicely  and  does  not  in  the  least  despise  those  arts 
of  the  toilet  by  which  the  ravages  of  years  are  repaired. 
She  has  quite  a  pretty  income  for  a  single  woman,  and 
has  brought  a  large  increase  of  comfort  into  the  house 
hold.  But  the  little  sisters  never  think  of  what  they 
would  lose  in  her  marriage.  Their  tender  souls  are  only 
alive  to  her  felicity.  They  are  sure  that  in  the  scheme 
of  divine  goodness  the  transgressions  of  "  that  man  "  to- 


THE   NOT  IMPOSSIBLE  HE.  237 

ward  the  comfortable  well-to-do  Crayshaw  will  be  repaired. 
They  have  formed  in  their  fancy  the  very  image  of 
the  man  who  is  coming  to  make  her  happy. 

"  I  am  sure  he  is  coming  soon,"  says  Miss  Sophie,  as 
she  looks  out  of  the  window,  gazing  up  and  down  the 
village  street  in  search  of  this  not  impossible  he.  "  And 
then  when  he  comes  we  shall  have  a  wedding  here.  How 
delightful  that  will  be  !  We  have  never  had  a  wedding 
in  the  family  ;  for  you  know  sister  and  me  are  so  bound 
up  it  wasn't  possible.  But  it  will  be  so  pleasant  for  you 
to  say  we,  my  dear.  I  is  such  a  chilly,  cold,  dismal  little 
word.  Sister  and  me  never  say  /.  If  we  had  been  obliged 
to  say  /,  possibly  we  might  have  married  long  ago.  I 
feel  in  my  bones,  Mary  Crayshaw,  that  he  is  coming  soon 
to  make  it  all  up  to  you  for  what  that  man  has  made  you 
suffer.  We  shall  have  to  lose  you  one  day,  sister  and  me. 
But  then  if  we  know  you  are  happy  with  him,  it  will  con 
sole  us.  We  should  hate  to  be  selfish,  sister  and  me." 

He  has  not  come  yet,  nor  are  there  any  imminent 
signs  of  him  on  the  horizon.  But  if  faith  can  move 
mountains,  he  will  certainly  appear. 


CHAPTER  XXVI. 

MRS.  LEGALITY  AT  THE  WILDERNESS  LODGE. 

TWO  or  three  enthusiastic  devotees  of  the  rod  and 
gun  have  built  small  shooting-boxes  within  a  few 
miles  of  the  village,  and  have  been  in  the  habit  of  coming 
out  to  them  from  the  city  at  any  and  every  season  when 
they  felt  the  need  of  rest  or  recreation. 

One  of  these,  known  as  the  Lodge,  is  charmingly  situ 
ated  among  the  oak  timber  in  the  upper  valley.  An 
extensive  pine  forest  stretches  away  on  the  hillside  behind 
the  house.  The  river  purls  peacefully  along  within  a 
stone's  throw,  and  here  spreads  out  to  a  greater  width, 
and  clears  itself  from  the  water-weed  in  broad  silver 
expanses.  The  place  is  as  solitary  and  sylvan  as  the 
forest  of  Arden.  One  wanders  about  in  the  open  glades 
carpeted  with  soft  turf  and  spotted  with  sunshine, 
expecting  to  come  upon  Touchstone  and  Audrey,  or  even 
fair  Rosalind  in  her  boyish  disguise.  A  little  clearing 
and  garden-patch  for  the  sake  of  those  savory  herbs  a 
sportsman  loves  with  his  game  and  fish  dinners  invite  the 
wild  bee  and  the  song-bird. 

The  Lodge  is  a  quaint  little  affair,  planned  by  an  old 
bachelor  to  his  liking,  with  half-a-dozen  rooms,  each 
furnished  with  a  fire-place  to  burn  logs  of  some  size,  on 
cold  days.  It  is  shingled  nearly  all  over  with  yellow 
cedar  shingles,  and  the  veranda  is  broad  and  pleasant, 
looking  westward.  The  lower  rooms  are  ceiled  and  wain 
scoted  with  Georgia  pine,  and  the  chambers  have 
received  one  rough  scratch-coat  of  plaster.  The  Lodge  is 
owned  by  a  celebrated  city  lawyer,  who,  at  home  an 


A  BACHELOR  PARADISE. 

elegant  man  of  society,  with  a  just  estimate  of  the  con 
venances  which  lie  in  dress-coats,  crush-hats,  gloves,  white 
neck-cloths,  and  other  tokens  of  the  humanities,  as  soon 
as  he  arrived  at  the  Lodge  put  on  a  dreadful  old  hat  and 
a  whole  suit  of  flannel  both  within  and  without,  allowed 
his  beard  to  grow  untrimmed,  and  appeared  in  old  boots 
and  shoes,  of  which  he  kept  a  large  collection  at  the 
Lodge  for  country  use. 

He  was  more  alert  and  springy  in  his  motions  than  a 
countryman,  and  it  was  only  by  these  tokens  you  could 
distinguish  him  from  a  native.  He  generally  brought  a 
friend  with  him,  Jack  Hildreth  by  name,  who  behaved  in 
the  same  way.  When  business  brought  them  to  the  vil 
lage  they  tried  to  slip  about  incognito  to  escape  the 
judge  and  the  parson,  and  the  inevitable  invitations  to 
dinner  and  tea.  Their  mail  was  carried  to  and  fro  by 
an  old  man  who,  with  his  wife,  kept  the  Lodge  in  per 
petuity,  on  the  tacit  understanding  that  they  had  secured 
a  life  berth.  An  old  horse  and  wagon  belonging  to  the 
establishment  was  used  by  the  gentlemen  to  carry  them 
to  distant  parts  of  their  preserve.  They  spent  the  day 
wading  up  brooks  in  great  india-rubber  boots  like  trunk- 
hose,  often  in  the  drenching  rain.  The  old  horse  was 
always  there  at  the  rendezvous,  by  a  pair  of  bars  with 
his  head  down — too  low-spirited  even  to  eat  post-meat — 
when  they  wished  to  be  taken  home,  where  they  entered 
like  the  blustering  west  wind,  hearty,  hungry,  and  happy, 
to  find  a  roaring  fire  of  light  wood  in  the  living-room, 
which  Mrs.  Burns  had  kindled.  Soon  the  appetizing 
odors  of  broiling  fish  began  to  diffuse  themselves  all  over 
the  house.  There  is  nothing  a  sportsman  enjoys  more 
than  eating  his  own  "  catch  "  brown,  and  cooked  to  a 
turn,  with  the  appropriate  sauces.  And  Mrs.  Burns  was 
very  good  at  sauces,  which  Mr.  Legality  had  taught  her 
to  make  after  recipes  secured  at  his  New  York  club. 

The  interior  of  the  Lodge  was  a  little  bare.     A  pair  of 


24°  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

large  hunting  dogs  went  all  over  it  at  will,  and  made 
themselves  perfectly  at  home  at  all  hours.  The  living- 
room  was  mainly  furnished  with  guns  and  fishing-tackle, 
artificial  flies,  and  cartridges,  and  various  trophies  of  the 
chase.  A  pair  of  immense  hawks'  wings  were  nailed 
against  the  wall,  and  the  brush  of  a  red  fox.  What  is 
the  use  of  curtains  or  shutters  when  you  have  no  neigh 
bors  but  the  rabbits  and  squirrels  and  wild  birds,  and  are 
very  fond  of  sunshine  flooding  your  rooms  ?  Mr.  Legality 
had  purchased  a  few  rocking-chairs,  which  struck  his 
fancy,  from  the  old  women  among  the  mountains,  and 
these,  with  half-a-dozen  braided  hand-made  rugs,  picked 
up  in  the  same  way,  were  the  main  furnishings  of  the 
sitting-room.  On  the  walls  were  photographs  of  one  or 
two  of  the  extra  large  trout  he  had  caught.  A  few  books 
lay  about  on  the  table  or  were  crowded  upon  a  little  shelf 
over  the  chimney-piece.  There  was  a  file  of  a  sporting 
magazine,  an  old  copy  of  Isaak  Walton,  an  odd  volume 
of  Horace,  a  few  French  novels,  and  one  or  two  works 
on  the  best  mode  of  making  artificial  flies.  On  the 
chimney-piece  was  ranged  an  assortment  of  pipes,  cigar- 
boxes,  and  bottles.  The  corners  of  the  room  were  taken 
up  with  old  boots  and  miscellaneous  "  traps." 

This  was  the  bachelor's  castle,  the  complete  epitome  of 
his  idea  of  rest  and  recreation,  free  from  bother  and 
nonsense.  Mrs.  Burns  could  cook  a  capital  fish  or  game 
supper,  and  he  had  the  pleasure  of  furnishing  the  ele 
ments  of  his  simple  cuisine.  The  air  was  delicious,  the 
scenery  beautiful ;  with  no  one  to  trouble  or  annoy,  no 
near  neighbors,  no  social  duties,  none  of  the  flummery  of 
fashion.  For  a  few  weeks  each  year  he  was  a  free  man. 
Every  one  about  the  establishment,  both  human  and 
canine,  did  exactly  as  he  or  she  pleased.  Jack  Hildreth, 
when  he  was  staying  at  the  Lodge,  went  regularly  to 
sleep  after  supper,  and  slept  the  entire  evening.  Mr. 
Legality  loved  him  more  than  a  more  brilliant  companion, 


M1SSMUSA   BECOMES   MRS.    LEGALITY.          24! 

for  he  exacted  nothing,  fell  readily  into  his  old  friend's 
ways,  and  took  life  on  the  easiest  terms. 

But  of  course  when  Mr.  Legality  emerged  from  his 
country  shell  and  returned  to  town  he  was  another  being. 
The  eager,  sharp-witted,  cultivated  town  man  forgot  the 
smell  of  spruce,  pine,  and  hemlock,  and  rushed  into  the 
arena  of  the  world  clad  in  the  habiliments  of  the  most 
advanced  civilization.  If  he  had  consulted  his  country 
self  when  he  found  such  unalloyed  enjoyment  with  his 
pipe,  and  his  old  boots,  and  his  faithful  and  rather  stupid 
friend,  he  never  would  have  married.  Mrs.  Burns, 
smoothing  her  apron  and  squinting  both  ways  for  Sunday 
with  her  crossed  eyes,  would  always  have  remained  his 
ideal  of  domestic  felicity.  But  it  was  while  masquerad 
ing  as  his  city  self,  enacting  the  fine  gentleman  in  the 
intervals  of  absorbing  "cases,"  that  he  fell  in  with  a 
charming  woman,  who,  if  not  in  the  first  bloom  of  youth, 
was  sufficiently  beautiful,  and  possessed  of  a  fine  fortune 
and  an  enviable  literary  reputation.  She  shared  all  the 
lawyer's  tastes  and  fancies.  While  sitting  on  a  satin  sofa 
in  a  handsome  drawing-room  she  adored  the  woods. 
She  had  never  angled  for  any  thing  in  a  mountain  lake, 
but  she  was  certain  she  should  like  it.  She  wrote  an 
exquisite  sonnet  from  Mr.  Legality's  description  of  the 
Lodge  and  the  wild  birds  singing  around  the  windows, 
and  it  was  published  in  the  Pacific  Monthly.  This  was 
only  a  few  weeks  before  Miss  Musa  became  Mrs.  Legal 
ity.  A  very  pretty  wedding  it  was,  with  a  half-column 
notice  in  the  daily  papers,  and  a  mention  of  all  the  dis 
tinguished  people  present. 

It  was  arranged  that  after  a  few  weeks  of  travel  they 
were  to  spend  the  summer  at  the  Lodge.  The  solitude 
would  be  so  sweet  to  a  happy  pair  newly  wedded,  exempt 
from  prying  neighbors,  city  visitors,  and  fuss  and  feathers. 
It  was  the  cream  of  rural  simplicity,  a  return  to  nature. 
Mr.  Legality  had  always  been  so  happy  at  the  Lodge 


242  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

that  in  his  fancy  it  was  surrounded  by  a  halo  of  light. 
He  thought  of  his  old  boots  and  his  fishing-tackle  with 
sentimental  fondness.  All  his  days  had  been  good  there, 
and  all  his  nights  serene.  The  flavor  of  Mrs.  Burns's 
coffee  and  broiled  fish  was  sweet  in  his  thoughts.  How 
many  delicious  meals  he  and  old  Jack  Hildreth  had 
enjoyed  under  the  rafters?  How  many  blessed  hours 
had  been  given  to  smoke  and  reverie,  and  the  healthy 
rest  that  comes  after  vigorous  exercise  in  the  open  air. 
His  wife,  with  her  poetic  temperament,  would  be  sure  to 
appreciate  the  Lodge  at  its  true  value. 

It  was  raining  when  they  reached  the  village  station, 
and  old  Burns  met  them  with  the  ancient  horse  and 
wagon.  Mrs.  Legality  had  declared  with  enthusiasm 
that  she  loved  to  rough  it,  but  her  face  fell  when  she 
beheld  this  rustic  establishment,  and  her  husband  felt  the 
little  chill  which  ran  down  to  the  tips  of  her  fingers  as  he 
helped  her  into  the  vehicle.  All  the  woods  and  ways 
were  damp  and  sweet  with  summer  rain.  The  boughs 
dripped,  and  a  mild  incense  came  up  from  the  earth,  and 
mingled  with  the  breath  of  verdure  and  wild-flowers. 
The  mountain  roads  were  crossed  by  brawling  brooks, 
and  the  low-hung  clouds  opened  to  show  the  distant 
hills.  Mrs.  Legality  said  it  was  perfectly  lovely,  but  a 
kind  of  homesickness  crept  over  her  as  they  went 
deeper  into  the  forest,  and  her  husband  thought  she  was 
tired  with  the  journey.  Man-like,  he  had  given  her  no 
particular  description  of  the  Lodge.  He  had  told  her  it 
was  plain  and  unpretending,  but  perfectly  comfortable, 
and  she  had  imagined  something  of  quite  Arcadian  pret- 
tiness  set  down  in  the  woods. 

Her  habits  were  very  nice.  She  had  always  been  pet 
ted,  admired,  and  praised.  The  little  house  when  she 
entered  it,  with  Mrs.  Burns  ducking  and  courtesying  at 
the  door,  gave  her  quite  a  new  idea  of  savage  rudeness. 
There  were  neither  curtains  at  the  windows  nor  carpets 


FIRST  IMPRESSIONS.  243 

on  the  floors — nothing  but  scenery  and  bare  walls.  And 
she,  a  bride  of  only  a  few  weeks'  duration,  not  so  young 
as  she  had  once  been,  to  be  sure,  but  still  with  a  high 
sense  of  personal  distinction  and  value,  had  been  brought 
to  this  place  to  pass  the  summer  !  Her  husband  tried  to 
whistle  as  he  always  did  when  he  put  off  the  old  man  at 
the  Lodge.  He  divested  himself  of  his  nice  clothes,  and 
got  into  that  easy  rig,  the  old  coat  and  shocking  bad  hat. 
His  wife  did  not  like  him  in  it.  She  secretly  felt  that  if 
she  had  first  seen  him  in  this  guise,  she  never  would  have 
married  him.  Although  it  had  been  tacitly  agreed  that 
Legality  was  to  have  it  all  his  own  way  at  the  Lodge,  and 
go  on  with  his  old  life  there,  while  Mrs.  Legality  ruled 
supreme  in  the  city  house,  she  could  not  help  saying  as 
she  lifted  her  dainty  skirts  to  keep  them  off  the  bare 
floor  : 

"  Don't  you  think,  my  dear,  it  would  be  well  to 
clean  ? " 

"  Oh,  I  let  old  Burns  and  his  wife  manage  all  that. 
They  sweep  and  scrub  the  house  out  now  and  then,  I 
suppose.  Why,  my  dear,  do  you  find  any  thing  amiss  ?" 

"  Oh,  no,"  she  responded  at  once.  "  The  situation  is 
perfectly  charming." 

Mrs.  Burns  cooked  as  nice  a  supper  as  she  could  for 
the  bride,  but  the  table-service  was  not  very  elegant,  and 
Mrs.  Legality,  whose  tastes  were  fastidious  in  such 
matters,  could  not  at  once  find  an  appetite.  Her  hus 
band  had  always  been  in  the  habit  of  pouring  out  his  own 
tea  and  coffee,  and  now,  when  his  wife  took  her  place  at 
the  tray,  he  had  an  odd  sense  of  not  being  at  home. 
Their  first  meal  was  certainly  not  a  success,  although 
each  tried  to  hide  from  the  other  how  little  it  was  enjoyed. 
In  the  evening  the  dogs  came  in  shaking  the  wet  from- 
their  thick  coats.  They  lay  down  before  the  fire  and 
soon  the  room  was  filled  with  damp  steam.  Strange  to 
say,  Mr.  Legality  did  not  seem  to  mind  it.  He  spent  the 


244  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

time  in  cleaning  his  old  guns  and  putting  his  fishing-tackle 
in  order.  Mrs.  Legality  tried  to  interest  herself  in  what 
seemed  of  such  absorbing  interest  to  him,  but  she  dis 
covered  with  some  dismay  that  she  had  no  taste  for  such 
things,  and  an  incipient  sentiment  of  jealousy  arose 
within  her  toward  this  love  of  sport  which  had  pushed 
her,  for  the  time  being,  from  the  first  place  in  her  hus 
band's  affections.  She  could  not  endure  the  smell  of 
the  dogs  ;  and  the  odor  of  old  Burns's  pipe  came  in  from 
the  kitchen,  where  he  was  smoking  very  vile  tobacco. 

She  excused  herself  early  on  the  plea  of  being  tired, 
and  went  to  bed.  The  silence  of  the  forest  around  the 
Lodge  was  portentous.  A  whippoorwill  came  close  to 
the  windows  and  gave  forth  his  mournful  cadence.  The 
tree-toads  added  to  the  Dantean  chorus.  Though  not 
so  very  young,  poor  Mrs.  Legality  went  to  sleep  sobbing 
into  her  embroidered  handkerchief.  What  a  bower  for  a 
bride  !  She  had  already  come  to  the  conclusion  that 
she  hated  a  lodge  in  a  vast  wilderness,  although  she  had 
sentimentalized  so  much  in  her  writings  over  this  life 
with  nature,  this  happy  seclusion  far  from  the  madding 
crowd. 

The  next  morning  was  warm  and  sunny  ;  the  forest 
glowed  resplendent  from  the  rain.  A  merry  breeze  blew 
the  rain-drops  like  diamond  spray  from  the  leaves.  Mr. 
Legality  was  up  early  to  enjoy  the  birds  and  to  wash 
some  of  the  city  dust,  as  he  said,  out  of  his  mind.  He 
invited  his  wife  to  go  fishing,  and  they  packed  themselves 
into  the  wagon  merrily  enough  with  old  Burns  to  drive. 
The  old  man  was  in  his  shirt-sleeves  smoking  a  pipe  of 
that  same  vile  tobacco.  The  wind  blew  the  smoke  back 
into  the  lady's  eyes,  and  almost  spoiled  the  pleasure 
•of  locomotion  over  rough  but  lovely  roads.  The  day 
was  too  bright  for  good  sport.  Mrs.  Legality  caught 
nothing,  and  she  looked  upon  the  patience  with  which 
her  husband  waited  for  a  rise  as  quite  phenomenal.  The 


M£S.   LEGALITY'S  DISCOVERY.  245 

hours  seemed  long  and  dull.  The  black  flies  and  midges 
troubled  her  not  a  little,  and  she  saw  a  large  black-snake 
near  the  lake-side,  which  made  her  feel  that  she  could 
never  go  back  to  that  place  with  any  comfort. 

After  that  day  she  excused  herself  from  fishing,  and  re 
mained  at  home  with  Mrs.  Burns,  who  showed  her  the 
chickens  she  had  reared  that  the  master  might  have  a 
new-laid  egg  for  his  breakfast  ;  and  a  litter  of  young 
puppies  in  which  he  took  delight.  But  these  things  had 
their  limits  in  the  way  of  diversion.  She  had  often  felt 
lonely  even  when  the  center  of  a  brilliant  circle,  and 
she  had  found  relief  in  breathing  out  her  longings  in 
verse  :  but  she  had  never  felt  as  lonely  as  now  that  she 
was  united  to  the  man  of  her  choice,  and  trying  vainly  to 
enter  into  the  joys  of  his  life.  Yet  it  would  be  ridicu 
lous  to  publish  her  heart-pangs  to  the  world.  Her  hus 
band  came  home  too  tired  from  his  day's  sport  to  engage 
in  literary  conversation.  Her  writing  gift  seemed  to 
have  left  her.  She  had  no  neighbors  or  friends — no  one 
but  Mrs.  Miggs,  who  brought  them  milk  and  butter. 
Her  fine  clothes  were  of  no  avail.  When  she  dressed  for 
dinner,  her  husband  did  not  seem  to  know  it,  so  she  took 
to  wearing  a  flannel  gown  all  day,  and  she  wept  as  she 
awoke  to  the  reality  of  things.  She  hated  roughing  it  in 
the  woods.  She  was  sophisticated  and  conventional  to  a 
degree,  and,  worse  than  all,  she  was  worldly.  She  could 
not  blame  Mr.  Legality,  but  she  discovered  that  she  had 
been  shamming  and  posing  about  something  of  which 
she  was  ignorant. 

Mr.  Legality,  finding  that  his  wife,  though  a  charming 
woman,  had  no  taste  for  sport,  and  could  not  sympathize 
with  him  about  flies,  and  bait,  and  fish-hooks,  and  did 
not  even  treasure  up  in  her  memory  the  exact  weight  of 
the  big  trout  he  caught  on  Thursday,  turned  with  affec 
tionate  longing  toward  the  thought  of  Jack  Hildreth, 
who  for  so  many  years  had  been  his  faithful  comrade.  But 


246  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

when  he  proposed  that  Jack  Hildreth  be  invited  for  a 
six-weeks'  visit  to  the  Lodge  he  found  his  wife  adverse 
to  the  plan.  She  disliked  Jack  Hildreth,  that  big,  burly, 
red-faced  man,  with  no  conversation,  who  cared  for 
nothing  but  eating  and  drinking  hot  toddy,  and  went 
regularly  to  sleep  in  his  chair  of  an  evening  and  snored 
in  all  the  notes  of  the  gamut.  Mr.  Legality,  with  a  good 
deal  of  inward  resistance,  gave  up.  the  idea  of  inviting 
his  old  friend  Jack. 

But  it  happened  just  at  this  time  that  he  was  called  to 
a  distant  city  to  attend  to  a  law  case  involving  a  great 
sum  of  money.  As  his  absence  might  extend  to  two  or 
three  weeks,  he  suggested  that  his  wife  invite  her  friend 
Miss  Leeds  to  pay  her  a  visit.  Mary  Leeds  had  a  pet 
mania  for  architecture  and  house  decoration.  And 
almost  the  first  word  she  said  after  entering  the  Lodge 
was  :  "  How  can  you  live  in  this  barrack  ?  Not  a  car 
pet,  nor  a  rug,  nor  curtain  to  the  window.  But  it  has 
possibilities,  my  dear,"  she  continued,  half  closing  her 
eyes  and  taking  it  all  in.  Her  fingers  itched  to  get  hold 
of  the  little  bare  place  and  transform  it  into  something 
habitable  and  inviting.  In  two  days  she  had  persuaded 
her  friend  to  do  over  the  Lodge  on  her  plan,  which  was 
simple  and  practicable,  and  to  give  Mr.  Legality  a  charm 
ing  surprise  on  his  return.  It  was  with  some  fear  of 
judgment  to  come  that  Mrs.  Legality  took  the  house  in 
hand.  But  once  in  the  thick  of  carpenters  and  decora 
tors,  she  forgot  all  about  the  consequences.  Her  own 
artistic  furniture  was  sent  up  from  the  city,  and  she  and 
Mary  Leeds  worked  like  nailers  to  get  every  thing  in 
order.  New  servants  were  hired  and  drilled,  and  poor 
old  Mrs.  Burns,  in  a  tearful  state,  was  degraded  to  the 
position  of  head  scullion  or  general  kitchen  assistant. 

"  Master  won't  like  the  doin's — I  know  he  won't,"  she 
said,  as  she  saw  all  the  guns  and  fishing-tackle  translated 
to  an  upper  room.  u  He'll  be  like  a  cat  in  a  strange  garret.'' 

The  Lodge  certainly  came  out  a  thing  of  beauty  under 


THE   LODGE  RETURNS    TO  ITS  OLD   STATE.      247 

the  skillful  hands  of  the  ladies,  and  there  was  much 
heart-trembling  to  see  how  Mr.  Legality  would  take  it 
when  a  telegram  arrived  announcing  his  speedy  return. 
He  took  it,  all  things  considered,  better  than  could  have 
been  expected,  although  he  seemed  a  little  dazed  at  first, 
and  could  hardly  put  two  words  together.  Mrs.  Burns 
dethroned,  the  guns  and  traps  all  put  away,  the  dogs 
kept  out  of  the  house  !  Where  was  he  ?  He  rubbed  his 
eyes.  The  old  happy  bachelor  days  had  vanished  for 
ever.  But  how  could  any  one,  even  his  own  wife,  know 
what  this  place  had  been  to  him  in  the  past  ?  Mrs. 
Legality  watched  him  closely.  There  were  no  outbursts, 
no  reproaches,  only  compliments,  a  little  satirical,  for  her 
and  her  friend. 

In  the  evening  he  took  a  walk  in  the  woods,  and  sat 
for  some  time  smoking  and  musing  on  a  log,  and  when 
he  came  into  his  transformed  cottage  he  sat  down  at  the 
new  Chippendale  desk,  and  wrote  several  letters.  His 
cheerfulness  and  serenity  had  entirely  returned.  In  two 
or  three  days  he  announced  to  Mrs.  Legality  that  he  had 
purchased  her  a  house  at  Newport — "  Tom  Bly's,  you 
know,  my  dear.  I  bought  it  at  a  great  bargain.  It  is 
beautifully  situated,  and  I  think  you  will  enjoy  it." 

Mrs.  Legality  has  spent  several  summers  in  her  New 
port  cottage,  and  Mr.  Legality  is  occasionally  seen  there, 
but  part  of  every  season  he  spends  at  the  Lodge  with  old 
Jack  Hildreth.  The  place  has  lapsed  into  its  former 
aspect,  as  the  artistic  furniture  has  all  been  removed  to 
the  Newport  house.  Mrs.  Burns  again  reigns  supreme 
in  the  kitchen.  The  mistake  Legality  made  was  in  mar 
rying  the  town  man  and  neglecting  to  marry  his  country 
self.  The  mistake  that  charming  woman,  Mrs.  Legality, 
made  was  in  supposing  she  could  live  up  to  her  own 
poems.  Mr.  Legality  most  unreasonably  hates  Mary 
Leeds.  When  we  have  made  a  mistake  it  is  natural  to 
hate  some  one  else  in  order  to  draw  the  lightning  away 
from  home, 


CHAPTER   XXVII. 

THE    "DIGS"  BOARDING-HOUSE. 

I^HE  arid  heat  which  changed  all  things  to  a  lifeless 
semblance  has  moved  off,  who  can  tell  where  ?  Now 
the  fresh  southwest  is  blowing,  and  the  baked  foliage 
opens  and  expands  its  leaves  like  lungs.  The  sky  fills 
up  with  loose  white  clouds  that  drift  idly  or  pile  them 
selves  up  into  thunder-heads,  with  pale-fire  gleams  and 
Vulcan  forges  glowing  in  their  breasts.  The  light  breezes 
skip  about  like  young  nymphs  sipping  honeydew,  and 
inhaling  the  best  of  the  perfumes.  These  are  hammock 
days,  when  the  sky  with  the  tree-tops  resting  against  it  is 
sufficient  for  happiness.  The  birds  seem  like  music- 
boxes  as  their  notes  steal  out  of  the  shade,  and  the  full 
ness  of  nature's  life  is  so  perfectly  content  with  itself, 
you  fall  into  the  same  mood  ;  you  lose  the  sense  of 
responsibility  for  the  miseries  of  the  human  race,  and  the 
eating  edge  of  your  own  cares  is  turned  aside. 

The  large  walnut  and  butternut  trees  stand  quiet  in 
the  home  fields  in  their  dark  branchiness,  and  cast  down 
rings  of  shade  upon  the  sun-splashed  grass.  The  cows 
huddle  about  them,  or  wade  into  the  shallow  streams  and 
cool  their  legs  as  they  idly  switch  off  flies  with  their  long 
tails.  To  lie  in  the  hammock  while  the  scent  of  mign 
onette  and  sweet  peas  steals  upon  you  from  the  garden, 
to  rest  in  the  shade  against  a  hay-cock  while  other  mis 
taken  and  ambitious  people  do  the  work  of  spreading, 
cocking,  pitching,  and  loading,  is  to  make  a  good  use  of 
life. 

The  country  invades  every  village  nook,  steals  in  on 
every  breath  of  air  because  it  is  haying-time.  The  gar- 


HAYING-TIME.  249 

dens  are  at  the  height  of  their  beauty,  but  without  this 
sense  of  union  with  woods  and  field  they  would  not  be 
half  so  charming.  Every  body  looks  rustic,  and  carries 
an  out-of-door  atmosphere.  The  doctor  has  put  on  an 
old  straw  hat,  and  looks  like  a  respectable  farmer.  The 
judge,  even,  is  caught  raking  in  his  shirt  sleeves,  and 
says  it  makes  him  sleep  well.  Women  when  they  drive 
out  with  their  slow,  gentle  nags,  come  home  with  the 
buggy  full  of  swamp  flowers.  The  children  string  berries 
on  straws  and  dangle  them  along,  while  hands  and  faces 
gather  a  purple  stain.  Young  lovers  walk  in  the  fields 
to  taste  the  sweetness  of  the  haying.  Merry  boys  and 
girls  romp  in  the  barn,  and  chase  each  other  up  and 
down,  while  the  old  folks  remember  how  they  did  just 
the  same  when  they  were  young.  They  talk  of  the  many 
years  their  aged  trees  have  borne  good  fruit,  and  how 
they  hold  out  yet — old  trees,  old  men  and  women — in  the 
kind  care  of  heaven. 

Most  of  our  young  collegians  are  at  home  now  for  the 
vacation.  Several  of  them  keep  boats  on  the  river,  and 
there  are  improvised  races  between  them  and  the  town- 
boys,  in  which  the  girls  take  a  lively  interest.  Some  of 
the  students  work  a  little  in  the  haying  field,  or  ride  their 
fathers'  old  hacks,  or  drive  the  women  folk  about  on 
social  errands.  Others,  clad  in  the  picturesque  knee- 
breeches  of  the  period,  with  canvas-topped  shoes  and 
rakish  little  caps,  devote  themselves  to  lawn-tennis  and 
base-ball.  A  few  reading-men  come  here  to  work  for 
honors  and  shut  themselves  away  from  temptation  in  the 
form  of  fascinating  sports  and  beguiling  young  women. 
They  take  their  exercise  early  in  the  morning  or  late  in 
the  evening,  and  devote  all  the  day  to  study.  They  are 
known  as  "  digs,"  and  are  greatly  despised  by  the  active 
young  fellows,  who  think  that  colleges  were  mainly  de 
vised  to  foster  noble  sports  and  "  bleed  governors."  For 
several  years  past  nearly  all  the  "  digs  "  have  boarded 


25°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

during  the  summer  vacation  with  a  peculiar  old  couple 
known  in  the  village  as  Wormwood  and  Gall.  This  old 
man  and  wife  own  a  gloomy,  stuffy  old  house  much  shut 
in  by  dense  foliage  trees.  They  live  entirely  in  -  the 
kitchen  part,  and  the  front  of  the  house  has  a  funereal 
look  except  when  reckless  boarders  insist  on  throwing 
wide  the  shutters  and  letting  in  the  sun  and  flies.  The 
two  old  people  do  all  their  own  work.  It  would  be  im 
possible  for  them  to  get  on  with  "  help  "  of  any  descrip 
tion.  They  are  not  on  speaking  terms  with  many  of 
their  neighbors,  owing  to  their  violent  tempers  and  the 
great  ease  with  which  they  take  offense.  They  are  not 
often  on  speaking  terms  with  each  other,  and  have  been 
known  by  ingenious  devices  to  pass  three  months  together 
without  exchanging  a  word.  Their  power  of  "  getting 
mad  and  staying  mad  "  is  considered  quiet  phenomenal 
even  in  a  community  where  oddities  abound. 

It  was  owing  to  the  absolute  silence  which  so  often 
reigns  in  *:hat  house,  due  to  the  fact  that  the  old  folks 
can't  or  won't  speak  to  each  other,  that  it  was  chosen  as 
a  vacation  boarding-place  by  a  mathematical  "  dig  "  of 
high  standing  in  his  college.  As  one  "  dig "  attracts 
another,  Wormwood  and  Gall  have  filled  up  pretty 
regularly  ever  since — with  this  class  of  boarders,  and  are 
now  doing  well  with  their  rooms.  When  the  old  couple, 
through  pride  or  obduracy,  are  unable  to  speak,  they 
write  to  each  other  on  a  slate  which  hangs  conveniently 
against  the  kitchen  wall,  somewhat  in  this  style  : 

She — "  I  want  you  to  get  in  some  wood,  to  pick  a  mess 
of  peas,  and  to  go  to  Peckham's  and  get  ten  pound  of 
granulated  sugar,  a  bar  of  soap,  and  a  codfish." 

He — "  I  want  you  to  sew"  a  buckle  on  my  galluses  ;  to 
look  after  them  currants  you  are  going  to  make  into  jel, 
and  to  give  Hinckley's  boy  that  shovel  I  borrered  if  he 
comes  when  I  am  out."- 

Sometimes,  when  a  neighbor  calls  on  business,  they 


NEW  BOARDERS.  25 1 

break  through  their  self-imposed  silence  and  begin  to 
talk  at  each  other  through  him,  and  then,  forgetting 
themselves,  get  accidentally  on  speaking  terms.  The 
boarders  are  always  glad  when  these  conversational 
episodes  come  to  a  close  and  silence  again  reigns  in  the 
kitchen. 

This  year,  by  an  unlooked-for  innovation,  not  at  all 
popular  at  first  with  the  "  digs,"  one  of  the  chambers  of 
the  house  was  let  to  two  young  girls  from  the  city, 
daughters  of  a  small  jeweler  on  an  unfashionable  avenue. 
These  girls  had  lived  all  their  days  in  the  noisy  street 
over  their  father's  shop,  and  had  never  enjoyed  at  one 
time  more  than  a  week  or  fortnight  of  seaside  or  country 
life.  They  would  not  now  have  come  to  the  village  for  an 
entire  season  but  for  the  fact  that  the  younger  girl,  Amy, 
had  developed  a  certain  weakness  of  the  chest.  The 
doctor  prescribed  mountain  air,  a  whole  summer  of  the 
purest  and  best,  and  so  they  came  to  the  village,  and 
took  the  cheapest  room  they  could  find  fi  *  two,  which 
happened  to  be  at  Wormwood  and  Gall's  with  the  "  digs." 

These  unsocial  young  men  almost  refused  at  first  to 
speak  to  them,  even  to  look  at  them  at  meal-time,  but  at 
length,  as  Amy  was  very  pretty  and  Hannah  was  hardly 
less  interesting  in  her  way,  the  ice  was  broken,  and  there 
came  to  be  a  little  subdued  talk,  even  laughter  about  the 
board.  Their  influence  was  felt  in  the  kitchen,  and  old 
Wormwood  and  Gall  had  not  been  so  amiable  in  years  ; 
they  were  almost  as  good  to  each  other  as  when  suffering 
from  an  influenza  or  sore  throat,  for  in  sickness  they  are 
good;  like  so  many  quarrelsome  people,  they  are  necessary 
to  each  other's  comfort.  Hannah  and  Amy  were  not  like 
the  over-dressed,  underbred  young  women  one  so  often 
sees  coming  out  of  the  tenements  on  city  avenues.  The 
mother  died  when  they  were  both  young,  and  after  Han 
nah  was  graduated  from  the  public  school  her  whole  life 
was  absorbed  in  taking  care  of  her  father  and  sister. 


252  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

She  only  regretted  now  that  she  could  not  cut  herself  in 
two,  the  one  half  to  remain  in  town  with  her  father,  while 
the  other  half  took  care  of  Amy  in  the  country.  Her 
letters  to  her  father  were  mainly  filled  with  items  like 
these  : 

"  The  weather  up  here  has  grown  much  cooler,  and  if 
the  change  has  reached  the  city,  I  do  hope  you  will  put 
on  your  medium  flannels — the  soft  red  ones  in  the  right- 
hand  corner  of  the  upper  bureau  drawer." 

On  coming  to  the  country  she  had  brought  a  bag  of  all 
the  possible  remedies  and  medicaments  Amy  might  need, 
each  bottle  neatly  tied  up  and  labeled.  The  collection 
also  contained  a  flask  of  liquid  blacking  with  which  she 
polished  up  Amy's  rather  shabby  old  shoes  and  her  own. 
Pretty  Amy,  lying  on  the  bed  at  night,  would  see  Han 
nah  working  away  at  the  shoes  as  she  placed  them  along 
the  wall  in  a  row  standing  upright  upon  their  heels. 

"  They  look  as  if  they  were  praying,"  said  Amy  lan 
guidly — "  like  black  priests,  you  know." 

"  So  they  are,"  responded  Hannah — "  praying  for  new 
soles." 

There  wasn't  a  thing  any  body  wanted,  from  a  shirt- 
button  to  a  clothes-brush,  that  Hannah  did  not  seem  to 
have  it  about  her.  Her  work-basket  was  the  very  epitome 
of  herself,  stocked  with  a  dainty  needle  case,  the  needles 
all  stuck  in  one  way  in  precise  rows,  with  neat  parti 
colored  balls  for  darning  Amy's  stockings,  and  varied 
spools  of  silk  and  cotton  for  mending  Amy's  gowns.  Her 
own  never  seemed  to  need  any  repairs.  Nothing  was 
ever  amiss  with  her  small  trim  figure,  and  the  old  boots 
she  said  were  praying  for  new  soles  looked  better  than 
new  ones  on  any  body  else.  But  Amy  was  naturally 
careless  and  scatter-brained,  and  now  in  her  languid, 
semi-invalid  state  she  was  sometimes  a  little  perverse 
about  taking  the  remedies  or  attending  to  the  precautions 
her  slave  of  a  sister  urged  upon  her. 


HANNAH  MAKES  FRIENDS.  253 

Though  Hannah  was  a  slave  to  Amy,  she  found  time 
to  make  friends  with  all  the  cats,  and  dogs,  and  birds, 
and  babies  in  the  village.  She  knew  the  Alderney  calf 
down  in  the  judge's  back  lot,  and  petted  the  long-legged, 
mouse-colored  colt  in  the  deacon's  paddock.  The 
country  babies  were  so  much  cleaner  and  sweeter  than 
any  she  had  known  in  the  city  avenue,  they  were  quite 
irresistible  to  Hannah  ;  and  yet  she  had  often  taken  in 
those  poor  grimy  city  toddlers,  bathed  them,  fed  them, 
given  them  a  nap  and  taken  them  home  to  their  mammas, 
like  tarnished  little  coins,  rubbed  bright,  and  showing  a 
pretty  image  and  superscription.  So  Hannah  and  Amy, 
who  also  was  very  fond  of  the  little  ones,  gathered  the 
babies  and  children  all  up  and  down  the  street.  They  came 
rushing  into  the  front-door  yard  ;  they  invaded  the  stoop 
of  Wormwood  and  Gall,  a  most  unheard-of  liberty,  for 
the  village  children  had  never  dared  to  enter  the  premises, 
even  when  ripe  plums  and  cherries  hung  temptingly 
within  the  garden  fence.  But  now  Hannah  and  Amy  had 
the  children  about  them  under  the  trees.  They  dressed 
their  dolls,  and  mended  their  toys,  and  taught  them  fas 
cinating  new  games.  They  even  induced  old  Wormwood 
to  bake  cookies  for  them,  to  the  wonder  of  the  neighbor 
hood. 

Amy  could  not  sit  up  the  entire  day  when  she  first 
came  to  the  village,  and  the  doctor  soon  discovered  her, 
as  he  discovers  every  stranger  within  the  gates.  He 
walked  up  on  to  the  piazza  one  day,  and  took  Amy's 
hand,  and  perhaps  he  felt  of  her  pulse.  But  he  did  not 
prescribe  any  thing.  That  afternoon  he  came  round  with 
his  granddaughter  in  the  old  wagon.  A  pillow  had  been 
placed  on  the  back  seat,  and  he  lifted  Amy  in  there, 
almost  without  saying  by  your  leave,  and  then  they  all 
trundled  off  on  a  round  of  visits  to  country  patients. 
The  doctor  allowed  Amy  to  go  to  sleep  while  they  trotted 
along,  but  he  never  allowed  her  to  talk  much.  They 


254  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

stopped  sometimes  at  farm-houses  and  obtained  a  drink 
of  buttermilk,  and  chatted  with  the  old  farmers  about 
the  crops.  Every  two  or  three  days  this  country  drive 
was  repeated,  and  Amy  grew  so  much  better  that  when 
the  father  came  out  to  pay  his  first  visit  to  his  girls,  he 
went  to  the  doctor  and  asked  for  his  bill,  and  was  as 
effusive  in  his  gratitude  as  such  a  dry,  undemonstrative 
man  could  be.  But  the  doctor  took  offense.  He  hated 
gratitude  put  into  words,  and  he  had  no  bill. 

The  city  jeweler  was  the  dearest  of  all  objects  to  his 
two  girls.  Amy  hung  upon  him  with  affection,  and 
Hannah  watched  over  his  comforts  and  sought  to  provide 
every  thing  unasked.  It  was  a  source  of  mortification  to 
Hannah  when  her  father  was  forced  to  suggest  any  thing 
he  wished  to  have  done.  He  was  one  of  those  neutral- 
colored  men,  who,  though  sturdy  in  constitution  and  phy 
sically  strong,  seem  to  have  been  stunted  by  shop  life. 
He  always  walked  and  spoke  and  coughed  in  a  certain 
way.  Spontaneity  seemed  totally  lacking  to  his  nature. 
He  soaked  up  all  the  care  and  affection  of  his  daughters 
like  a  sponge,  and  made  no  sign.  And  yet  he  was  an 
excellent  father.  When  the  girls  led  him  to  the  woods 
and  fields  and  showed  him  birds  and  flowers,  all  the  things 
young  creatures  love,  he  took  it  like  a  dose  of  something 
he  had  bought  for  five  cents  at  the  apothecary's,  which 
might  possibly  do  good  to  his  interior. 

Of  course  all  these  things  could  not  go  on  at  Worm 
wood  and  Gall's  without  affecting  the  boarding  "  digs  " 
more  or  less.  Life  had  certainly  changed  there,  and  was 
far  less  tomb-like  and  silent.  There  may  have  been 
some  open  grumbling  and  more  suppressed  wrath.  But 
when  the  father  came,  that  great  mathematical  "  dig," 
who  had  always  lived  the  existence  of  an  owl,  working 
daytimes  and  going  out  for  exercise  at  night,  astonished 
every  body  by  inviting  him  and  his  girls  to  a  boating 
excursion  on  the  river  in  pursuit  of  water-lilies.  The 


THE  DEPTH  OF  A   DIMPLE.  255 

afternoon  was  delightfully  cool,  and  the  river  reaches 
smoothed  themselves  like  polished  silver,  sensitive  to  the 
reflection  of  every  leaf,  and  bough,  of  every  spear  of 
grass  and  gleam  of  daisy  and  cardinal-flower  on  the 
bank,  until  the  under  world  grew  into  a  magic  scene,  and 
the  boat  often  seemed  to  slip  through  air  above  a  garden 
of  the  gods,  paved  with  clouds  and  spaces  of  the  sky 
more  beautiful  than  the  real  heavens.  So  they  passed 
into  little  bights  and  coves  where  the  water-lilies  lay  in 
tranquil  fleets,  and  the  happy  girls  pulled  up  the  buds  by 
their  long,  flexible  stems,  in  anticipation  of  their  open 
ing  in  the  morning. 

Papa,  though  he  never  changed  his  expression, 
seemed  to  show  a  glimmer  of  enjoyment,  as  he  sat  in  the 
end  of  the  boat  and  talked  with  "  Mathematics,"  as  he 
was  called,  about  the  new  standard  time.  The  latter,  as 
he  hurled  the  boat  along  with  the  university  stroke,  sit 
ting  firmly  braced,  was  trying  to  calculate  the  exact  depth 
of  a  dimple  in  Hannah's  cheek,  a  dimple  which  showed 
itself  only  when  she  was  perfectly  happy.  Considering  the 
very  retired,  solitary,  owlish  nature  of  Mathematics,  that 
problem  about  the  dimple  seemed  an  exceedingly  diffi 
cult  one,  and  the  other  "digs,"  who  had  made  less  of  a 
merit  of  their  devotion  to  work,  began  mildly  to  chaff 
him.  Even  after  the  jeweler  went  back  to  town,  Math 
ematics  asked  Hannah  a  few  times  to  go  out  with  him 
in  the  boat,  in  those  long  magical  twilights  of  July,  when 
the  river  blushes  in  sympathy  with  the  sunset  rose,  which 
you  must  explore  with  sharp  eyes  to  find  a  thread  of 
crescent  moon  swimming  in  the  pink  vapors.  Then  the 
trees  plunge  darkly  down  into  the  depths  and  the 
vague  purple  lights  of  the  zenith  bring  the  first  stars, 
with  cool,  delicious  winds,  and  odors  of  new-mown  hay 
from  the  low  meadows  skirting  the  banks.  It  is  an  hour 
made  for  the  young,  whether  they  be  "  digs  "  or  pleasure- 
loving  spendthrifts  of  time. 


256  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

It  is  generally  too  late  for  Amy  to  go  out  in  the  boat, 
owing  to  the  damp,  and  a  classical  "dig"  has  taken  to 
sacrificing  himself  somewhat  to  her  amusement.  Were 
she  entirely  well  and  strong,  he  probably  would  ignore 
her.  But  he  knows  that  a  benevolent  mind  should  be 
willing  to  divert  a  semi-invalid,  let  it  cost  what  it  may. 
So  he  sings  her  college  songs,  shows  her  some  curious 
tricks  at  cards,  and  plays  a  good  many  games  of  back 
gammon  with  her.  "  Double-sixes,  by  Jove  !  I  shall 
beat  this  time."  Whoever  beats,  little  Amy  is  likely  to 
come  out  ahead. 

Of  course  these  things  are  observed.  Old  Wormwood 
and  Gall  have  even  been  forced  to  talk  about  them  a  lit 
tle  with  each  other — mainly  by  grunts  and  exclamations. 
Wormwood  has  such  a  bad  opinion  of  husbands,  she  may 
solemnly  warn  the  girls  against  them  before  they  go 
home.  I  can  not  affirm  that  Mathemtaics  will  ever 
marry  Hannah.  But  it  is  certain  that  abstracted  minds 
need  just  such  motherly,  care-taking  wives  as  she,  and  if 
they  do  wed,  the  match,  every  body  will  say,  was  made  in 
heaven. 


CHAPTER  XXVIII. 

THE     OLD      SWEETHEART. 

ON  Railroad  Street  stands  a  row  of  small  tenements 
that,  like  a  number  of  breakfast-rolls  in  a  pan,  seem 
to  have  run  together  and  combined  their  shabby  ugliness 
without  aim,  for  there  is  land  enough  and  to  spare  for 
detached  dwellings  with  yards  and  gardens.  Most  of 
these  houses  are  occupied  by  laborers'  families,  but  at 
the  north  end  of  the  row  live  the  Widow  Bowen  and  her 
daughter,  Susan.  You  will  know  the  place,  because  it  is 
free  from  old  hats  stuck  into  broken  window  panes,  and 
the  scrap  of  yard  in  front  is  neatly  swept.  "  The  Widow 
Bowen,  she  that  was  Jane  Hinman."  It  is  thus  the 
neighbors  always  speak  of  her.  In  old  times  the  Hin- 
mans  were  of  the  village  elect,  and  held  their  heads  as 
high  as  any  body.  Jane  was  a  handsome  girl  and  had 
many  good  offers,  but  she  chose  in  the  end  to  marry 
Bowen,  who  was  of  no  particular  account,  and  finally 
faded  out  of  life  leaving  his  wife  poor,  with  one  little 
girl.  She  had  buried  four  children  on  the  hill,  and  had 
known  troublous  times  all  through  her  married  life,  and 
struggle  and  poverty  and  hard  work  had  attended  the 
widow's  steps  ever  since.  The  fortunes  of  the  Hinmans 
had  run  to  seed.  They  had  died  out  or  left  the  place,  and  a 
generation  arose  which  knew  them  not.  Only  the  Widow 
Bowen  and  her  daughter  Susan  remained  in  that  poor 
corner  tenement,  where  they  toiled  from  morning  till 
night  at  sewing-machine  work,  finishing  off  coats  and 
trowsers  at  so  much  the  dozen  for  a  ready-made  clothing 
house  in  a  neighboring  town. 


258  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

Huge  parcels  came  for  them  by  the  train,  and  were 
left  in  the  care  of  the  baggage-master  and  carried  to  the 
widow's  door  by  Sambo  Brown.  Year  in  and  year  out 
the  mother  and  daughter  labored  at  this  work,  Mrs. 
Bowen  doing  the  lighter  portions,  while  Susan,  who  was 
vigorous,  bore  the  brunt  of  toil.  They  often  worked 
fourteen  hours  a  day,  beginning  in  summer  at  five  o'clock. 
The  hum  of  their  machine  was  heard  by  the  Irish 
laborers  as,  dinner-pail  in  hand,  they  trudged  past  the 
window  at  six.  Sometimes  a  female  neighbor  with  a 
gentle  horse  she  could  drive  herself  came  and  took  Mrs. 
Bowen  for  an  hour's  airing  in  her  buggy.  But  these 
were  rare  occasions.  The  widow  could  not  spare  the 
time  on  week  days,  and  Sunday  driving  is  not  fashiona 
ble  in  the  village.  But  Sunday  being  the  only  leisure 
time  they  had,  Susan  and  her  mother  in  fine  weather 
often  locked  the  house  and  went  to  the  woods  for  the 
entire  day,  carrying  their  dinner  with  them.  They  sel 
dom  attended  church.  Some  of  the  neighbors  talked,  as 
they  will  in  a  small  place,  and  the  sympathies  of  a  certain 
strict  class  of  villagers  were  alienated.  But  the  young 
clergyman  always  remained  friendly  ;  and  he  often 
brought  them  the  latest  magazines  and  reviews,  which 
Susan  read  to  her  mother  in  their  Sunday  outings.  Be 
ing  a  modest  man,  he  thought  the  new  literature  would 
do  them  as  much  good  as  his  sermons  ;  and  he  liked  to 
talk  over  with  Susan  what  she  had  read. 

Susan  Bowen  was  very  plain.  People  said  she  did  not 
"feature"  the  Hinmans,  and  as  for  the  Bowens,  they 
were  of  too  little  importance  for  any  one  to  remember 
their  characteristics.  Susan's  upper  teeth  projected, 
and  she  could  not  easily  close  her  lips  over  them.  Her 
hair  was  rather  harsh  and  wiry,  and  her  complexion  dark 
and  without  bloom.  But  she  was  wonderfully  strong  in 
body  and  had  never  known  a  day's  illness  in  her  life. 
She  wore  large  calf-skin  shoes,  a  short  gown  of  some  cheap 


SUSAtf.  259 

stuff,  cotton  gloves,  and  a  little  round  hat  which  kept  its 
place  on  her  head  season  after  season,  regardless  of  the 
changes  of  fashion.  Susan  spoke  out  what  she  had  in 
her  mind  without  fear  or  favor.  At  sixteen  she  had  said 
openly  that  she  would  never  marry,  because  no  one  would 
think  of  marrying  her  whom  she  could  accept.  She  talked 
of  her  plainness,  her  large  hands  and  feet,  and  even  made 
a  joke  of  them.  She  never  disguised  her  poverty  or 
made  the  least  pretense  of  hiding  the  family  misfortunes, 
but  on  the  contrary  she  made  no  appeal  for  sympathy. 
She  was  an  unusually  large,  strong,  vigorous  girl  at  an 
early  age,  and  it  behooved  her  to  maintain  constant 
cheerfulness  of  demeanor,  and  to  sustain  her  mother,  who 
certainly  was  the  weaker  vessel.  Genuine  folk  are  rec 
ognized  sooner  or  later  even  in  spiteful  little  commu 
nities.  People  would  bear  a  great  deal  of  truth- 
telling  from  Susan  just  because  she  was  Susan. 
Her  word  was  as  good  as  a  bond  ;  and  she  had  the 
kind  of  manly  honor  that  never  breaks  a  contract  or  dis 
regards  a  promise.  Milly  Grant,  the  village  milliner, 
with  whom  she  maintained  the  closest  intimacy,  had  a 
great  admiration  for  her  because  she  felt  that  no  one  but 
herself  had  ever  sounded  the  height  and  depth  and  full 
ness  of  Susan's  genuine  excellence.  She  regretted  that 
Susan  was  not  a  man,  so  that  she  might  marry  her. 

But  Susan,  with  all  her  mannish  virtues,  was  very 
womanly.  She  was  strong  to  sustain,  and  she  was  tender 
to  comfort  and  help.  Her  heart  was  capacious,  and 
balanced  her  excellent  head.  The  position  of  mother 
and  daughter  had  been  changed.  Susan  was  the  wheel- 
horse,  as  she  said,  and  she  felt  a  protecting  fondness  for 
her  mother's  foibles  that  made  up  to  that  poor  woman  for 
a  great  deal  she  had  suffered.  They  drew  together  into 
a  united  life.  Susan  knew  she  could  never  have  a 
romance,  and  her  mother's  young  career  was  of  the 
greatest  interest  to  her.  They  lived  it  all  over  again  in 


260  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

their  leisure  hours,  retouching  the  faded  colors,  that 
Susan  might  realize  what  it  is  to  be  young,  to  win  admira 
tion,  and  to  have  lovers — she  who  had  known  no  youth 
and  could  never  enter  personally  into  that  magic  realm. 
Mrs.  Bowen  possessed  certain  remnants  of  her  old  vanity, 
although  so  much  had  been  beaten  out  of  her  by  a  hard 
fate.  She  was  a  little  weak  about  dress,  as  so  many  by 
gone  beauties  are,  and  she  liked  to  adorn  herself,  with 
the  vague  feeling  that  somebody  might  still  come  to 
admire  her,  although,  in  fact,  nobody  ever  did  come,  at 
least  not  for  a  long  time.  Nearly  all  the  small  sums  that 
could  be  spent  on  clothes  were  laid  out  for  her  benefit, 
Susan  contenting  herself  with  a  style  of  costume  in  which 
she  always  looked  the  same  winter  and  summer,  spring 
and  fall.  But  she  dressed  her  mother's  still  unfaded 
hair,  and  put  on  the  becoming  ribbons  and  bits  of  lace 
much  as  a  fond  mamma  adorns  her  little  girl.  She 
admired  her  mother  more  than  any  one,  and  wished  to 
keep  her  young  and  pretty  a  long  time. 

The  widow  still  possesred  a  few  small  trinkets  which 
had  not  yet  been  parted  with  to  pay  the  rent  or  to  fur 
nish  necessaries.  By  far  the  most  interesting  of  these, 
as  a  memento  of  her  girlhood,  was  a  gold  locket  contain 
ing  two  strands  of  hair,  one  auburn  and  the  other  brown, 
intvvined  together,  with  a  curious  cipher  beneath  them 
engraved  on  the  gold.  The  auburn  lock  had  belonged 
to  Jane  Hinman  when  she  was  a  girl  of  eighteen.  The 
brown  lock  had  never  grown  on  Bowen's  head.  It  dated 
back  to  an  earlier  romance  in  Jane  Hinman's  life,  the 
episode  which  now  most  deeply  engrossed  both  Susan 
and  her  mother,  the  period  they  most  frequently  talked 
over  in  confidential  moments.  In  Mrs.  Bowen's  work- 
table  drawer  there  was  a  packet  of  yellow  letters,  con 
nected  with  the  locket  and  braided  strands  of  hair,  and  a 
little  story  of  broken  vows  and  disappointed  hopes. 
Jane  Hinman  had  been  engaged  before  she  met  Bowen. 


SENATOR  FIELDING.  261 

There  had  been  a  misunderstanding,  a  quarrel,  perhaps, 
and  the  ring  was  given  back,  and  that  was  all.  But  it 
was  a  great  deal  to  Susan,  indeed  the  central  point  of 
interest  in  her  mother's  unfortunate  life.  Holding  the 
letters  loose  in  her  lap,  and  with  that  locket  open  before 
her,  she  would  try  to  realize  the  whole  situation. 

"  And  to  think,  Jane  "  (she  called  her  mother  Jane  in 
her  playful  or  sentimental  moods) — "  to  think  that  Ben 
Fielding  is  now  a  United  States  Senator,  a  great  man  in 
his  own  State,  likely  to  be  governor  soon,  and  possibly 
president.  Just  try  to  imagine  how  it  would  be  with  you 
if  you  had  married  him.  Who  would  ever  suspect  that 
the  possible  Mrs.  Senator  Fielding  has  been  finishing  off 
slop-shop  coats  and  trowsers  all  these  years  at  starvation 
prices  ?  Oh,  Jane,  that  was  a  sad  day  for  you  when  you 
quarreled  with  the  future  senator.  But  where  would  I 
have  been  had  you  married  Ben  Fielding  ?  I  could  never 
have  been  born  a  senator's  daughter.  I  presume  I  should 
not  have  come  into  existence  at  all.  And  I  am  so  large 
and  strong,  such  a  positive  character — there  is  so  much 
of  me — it  is  impossible  to  think  calmly  of  the  narrow 
escape  I  made  of  not  getting  born." 

Mrs.  Bowen  had  no  great  amount  of  humor.  She 
generally  let  Susan's  nonsense  go  by  her  like  the  wind, 
but  it  was  a  very  serious  matter  to  her  that  she  had  just 
missed  being  Mrs.  Senator  Fielding.  It  invested  her 
with  an  amount  of  romantic  interest  in  her  own  eyes 
which  enabled  her  to  despise  the  benighted  people  who 
knew  not  the  Hinmans.  It  helped  to  keep  her  young 
and  good-looking,  with  a  certain  elegance  of  manner  that 
Susan  admired  because  she  had  never  been  able  to  attain 
to  manners.  She  was  irrevocably  barred  out  from  that 
mysterious  and  fascinating  region.  Mrs.  Bowen  would 
sigh  an  answer  to  Susan's  remark  as  she  turned  a  seam 
or  sewed  on  a  button. 

"  He  was  very  high-tempered  and  overbearing,  Susan, 


262  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

and  always  would  get  his  own  way.  He  made  mountains 
out  of  molehills,  and  took  his  religion  very  hard  (as  if  it 
had  been  some  sort  of  contagious  disease).  He  inclined 
to  the  Methodists,  and  dancing  and  light  amusements 
were  abominations  in  his  eyes.  He  tried  to  make  me 
promise  I  would  not  go  to  balls.  But  the  Hinmans  had 
always  belonged  to  the  Church.  My  grandfather  built 
the  little  chapel  at  the  Hollow  mainly  for  his  own  family, 
and  used  to  read  prayers  himself.  He  put  up  a  cross  in 
front,  and  some  of  the  folks  blamed  him  for  it  and  said 
it  was  papistical.  But  being  of  the  Church,  we  were 
always  allowed  to  dance  and  amuse  ourselves  innocently, 
and  when  Ben  tried  to  make  me  promise,  there  was 
trouble." 

Susan,  although  she  secretly  hated  the  domineering 
person  her  mother  drew,  always  took  his  part.  "  He  had 
character  anyway,"  snipping  her  thread.  "  There  was 
something  to  him.  If  I  had  been  there,  Jane,  I  suspect 
I  should  have  been  on  his  side.  I  couldn't  dance  if  I 
tried,  any  more  than  a  cow  ;  and  folks  are  very  apt  to 
condemn  the  follies  they  can't  indulge  in.  But  I  guess 
the  senator  has  changed  a  good  deal.  I  presume  now  he 
is  as  worldly  as  a  Hinman.  They  say  Washington  is  a 
pretty  hard  place." 

"  He  never  would  go  wrong,  Susan.  You  ought  not 
to  suspect  such  a  thing.  His  principles  were  just  like 
iron.  If  he  had  been  a  little  more  yielding,  or  I  had  been 
a  little  less  pleasure-loving,  things  might  have  come  out 
different.  Pass  me  that  spool  of  black  twist,  Susan." 

"  I  am  sorry  he  took  the  wrong  side  on  the  pig-iron 
and  whisky  question,"  remarked  Susan.  "  If  he  hadn't, 
I  should  have  respected  him  more."  Susan  was  a  fervent 
politician,  and  watched  the  senator's  course  in  Congress 
with  a  lynx  eye.  Once  or  twice  she  had  thought  of  writ 
ing  to  him  vigorously  to  protest  against  some  of  his 
measures  which  she  did  not  approve.  But  she  contented 


"JANE  HINMAN  IS  DEAD."  263 

herself  composing  letters  to  him  in  her  head,  and  putting 
in  just  as  many  forcible  words  as  she  could,  while  she 
shunned  all  fine  phrases. 

So  these  two  poor  women  toiled  on  for  their  daily 
bread  down  there  on  Railroad  Street,  while  they  cherished 
an  interest  in  the  large  affairs  of  the  nation  their  neigh 
bors  knew  not  of.  Senator  Ben  Fielding  and  his  growing 
fame  certainly  did  enlarge  their  horizon. 

One  Saturday  night  Susan  had  gone  to  call  upon  Milly 
on  Main  Street,  and  on  her  return  she  burst  into  the  room 
and  found  her  mother  half  asleep  dozing  in  her  chair  in 
the  soft  brown  twilight  of  a  midsummer  evening.  Mrs. 
Bowen  rubbed  her  eyes,  with  the  dim  consciousness  that 
Susan  was  excited.  "  What  is  the  matter  ?  "  said  she 
drowsily,  sitting  up  straight  in  her  chair.  "  Matter  !  why, 
mother,  he  is  here,  visiting  Judge  Magnus.  He  came 
last  night."  Susan  uttered  the  words  as  if  she  had  been 
a  Delphic  priestess  giving  forth  the  oracle. 

"  He,  Susan  ;  whom  do  you  mean  ?  " 

"  He,  of  course  ;  Senator  Ben  Fielding." 

"  You  don't  say  Ben  Fielding  has  come  back  to  the  vil 
lage  !  Well,  I  dare  presume  he  has  forgotten  me.  He 
must  think  I  am  dead." 

"  You  know  that  is  a  piece  of  affectation,  mother.  It 
is  probable  he  has  made  particular  inquiries  after  Jane 
Hinman." 

"  Jane  Hinman  is  dead  anyhow.  He  knows  nothing 
about  the  Widow  Bowen  ;  and  I  don't  see  that  his  visit 
concerns  us.  Susan,  won't  you  light  the  lamp  ?  " 

While  Susan  was  lighting  the  lamp,  and  the  darkness 
still  lingered,  she  brought  out  her  last  great  piece  of 
news  :  "  Mother,  he  is  a  widower  ;  has  been  one  two 
years." 

"  I  dare  presume,  Susan.  His  wife,  I  heard,  was  a 
sickly  woman.  They  had  three  children." 

"  One  dead,"   put  in  Susan   laconically,  as  she  turned 


264  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

up  the  wick,  "  and  the  other  two  grown,  and  doing  for 
themselves." 

"  I  don't  see  how  it  concerns  us,  Susan.  I  am  a  faded 
old  woman."  But  her  eyes  looked  singularly  bright,  and 
her  voice  quavered  with  a  new  emotion.  Susan  would 
not  give  in  to  her  mother's  artifices.  She  knew  that 
somehow  it  did  concern  them  that  Senator  Ben  Fielding 
was  in  town.  They  did  not  talk  much  together,  and 
though  both  pretended  to  rest  well,  there  was  but  little 
sleep  for  them  that  night.  The  next  morning  they 
debated  as  to  whether  they  should  go  to  church,  and 
finally  decided  in  the  negative.  It  would  look  too  marked 
just  to  go  to  see  him,  though  they  did  not  say  so.  Neither 
did  they  speak  of  going  to  the  woods  or  down  by  the 
river  on  their  usual  Sunday  ramble.  They  sat  at  home 
all  the  morning,  the  sewing  all  put  by. 

Susan  dressed  her  mother  with  great  care.  She 
even  put  an  extra  touch  to  her  own  appearance, 
she  could  hardly  have  told  why.  She  was  glad  of 
the  housework,  which  kept  her  busy.  But  the  widow 
sat  silent  with  her  hands  clasped  and  that  bright  ex 
pectancy  in  her  eyes.  Judge  Magnus  was  to  give 
the  senator  a  grand  dinner  on  Monday.  How  would 
he  find  time  to  think  of  poor  Jane  Hinman  and  her 
broken  fortunes  ?  But  he  did  find  time  to  think  of 
her.  It  was  just  four  o'clock  when  a  stranger  clicked  the 
little  gate.  He  was  tall  and  rather  imposing,  with  a 
square  forehead,  a  square  chin,  and  a  powerful  jaw.  He 
wore  square-toed  boots,  and  even  his  watch  chain  was 
composed  of  little  cubes  of  gold.  The  iron-gray  side- 
whiskers  gave  him  an  air  of  distinction  he  had  not  pos 
sessed  in  his  younger  years,  but  his  eyes  were  of  a  steely 
benevolence,  without  humor.  Humor  was  the  one  thing 
Ben  Fielding  had  always  lacked. 

Susan  hastily  kissed  her  mother  when  she  saw  what 
was  impending,  and  then  dashed  out  the  back  way. 


WIDOWERS'  INTENTIONS.  265 

She  slipped  through  a  broken  picket  in  the  door- 
yard  fence,  and  crossed  Mrs.  Hodge's  garden,  and 
by  winding  ways  reached  a  back  street  and  made 
for  a  shady  spot  by  the  river.  She  sat  down  on  the 
ground  among  the  ferns  and  let  her  hat  fall  back,  and 
with  her  hands  clasped  about  her  knees  lost  sight  of 
every  thing  before  her  eyes  in  her  intense  sympathy  for 
her  mother.  He  had  come  to  make  a  friendly  call,  of 
course,  but  Susan  did  not  believe  it.  She  knew  that 
widowers,  when  their  hearts  have  healed  by  the  first  in 
tention,  always  have  intentions.  They  are  the  least 
ingenuous  members  of  the  human  race.  See  was  think 
ing  of  Jane  Hinman  and  the  Widow  Bowen,  and  the  dark 
ways  they  had  traveled  as  mother  and  daughter,  when 
she  had  borne  the  laboring  oar  ;  and  a  tide  of  pity  and 
love  seemed  to  sweep  her  away,  mingled  with  the  excite 
ment  of  this  strange  romance  which  was  touching  her 
mother  again  in  the  afternoon  of  her  days. 

Susan  never  knew  how  long  she  sat  there  on  the  river- 
bank  among  the  ferns.  She  found  it  growing  dark  when 
she  took  her  way  home.  Her  mother  met  her  at  the 
door  with  her  eyes  half  full  of  tears,  and  quivering  with 
suppressed  emotion.  She  put  her  arms  round  her  daugh 
ter,  and  like  Ruth  and  Naomi  they  clung  together  in 
silence  for  a  time. 

"  Oh,  you  can't  think  what  he  said.  It's  all  the  same 
as  if  I  hadn't  grown  old.  He  wants  me  to  be  his  wife. 
He  came  here  on  purpose,  Susan,  to  ask  me.  He  says 
he  has  money  enough,  and  every  thing,  and  he  don't  care 
if  I  am  ever  so  poor  and  don't  know  how  to  appear,"  she 
went  on  a  little  incoherently. 

Susan  put  her  mother  down  in  the  rocker  and  smoothed 
her  hair.  "  You  must  quiet  yourself,  or  you  will  have 
one  of  your  bad  headaches.  But  just  tell  me  if  you  have 
promised  to  be  Mrs.  Senator  Fielding." 

"  How  could  I  promise,"  she  returned  reproachfully, 


266  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

"  without  talking  with  you  ?  It  all  depends  on  you, 
Susan,  and  the  very  thought  of  it  makes  me  dizzy." 

"  I  shan't  stand  in  the  way,  mother  ;  I  shall  never 
trouble  him." 

"  Susan  Bowen,  what  do  you  mean  ? " 

"  He  can't  be  expected  to  marry  the  whole  family. 
He  has  come  for  his  old  sweetheart,  Jane  Hinman,  and 
not  for  Susan  Bowen,  clumsy  old  Susan." 

"  You  want  to  make  me  sick,"  breaking  out  into  sobs  ; 
"  that  is  just  what  you  want  to  do." 

"  No,  I  don't,  mother  ;  but  I  can't  deceive  you.  We 
have  always  been  one,  you  and  I,  but  it  can  be  so  no 
longer.  Jane  Hinman  was  born  for  another  fate.  And 
now  she  is  coming  into  her  kingdom.  But  Susan  Bowen 
was  made  to  endure  hardness,  to  live  alone,  and  eat  the 
bread  of  labor.  He  would  not  like  my  influence  over 
you.  He  must  rule  alone  ;  I  can  see  it  in  the  square  set 
of  his  jaw." 

"That's  just  it,  Susan  ;  he  ain't  changed  a  bit.  Such 
men  never  do  change.  I  can  feel  the  iron  Ben  Fielding 
under  all  this  new  velvet.  He  didn't  have  his  way  with 
me  when  he  was  young,  and  he  wants  to  get  it  now  he  is 
old.  He  let  it  drop  that  his  God  must  be  my  God  ;  and 
it  was  so  like  old  times  it  made  me  shiver." 

"  I  guess  his  God  is  made  in  the  likeness  of  the  sen 
ator,"  said  Susan  bitterly,  but  this  was  all  she  would  say 
to  influence  her  mother,  who  kept  insisting  that  he  was 
generous  and  kind,  and  wondrous  condescending  to  the 
poor  Widow  Bowen.  She  felt  it  a  grievance  that  Susan 
would  not  join  in  these  eulogiums,  but  maintained  a 
dogged  silence.  Her  sturdy  strong  soul  felt  a  sorrow 
tugging  at  her  heart-strings,  such  as  she  had  not  known 
in  all  her  years  of  toil  and  privation.  The  splendid  prospect 
opened  by  the  visit  of  the  great  man,  though  it  dazzled 
the  widow's  eyes,  brought  no  real  joy  to  that  poor  house. 
Before  going  to  bed  Susan  told  her  mother  she  would 


MRS.  BO  WEN'S    MORAL   SUBLIMITY.  267 

depart  early  the  next  morning  by  the  train  to  take  home 
the  finished  bundle  of  work,  and  leave  the  coast  clear. 
The  senator  was  to  receive  his  answer  that  day.  She 
did  not  sleep  until  near  morning,  and  then  it  seemed 
that  she  had  just  fallen  into  her  first  uneasy  nap  when  a 
nervous  grasp  was  laid  on  her  shoulder. 

"  I  can't,  I  can't,"  sobbed  poor  Mrs.  Bowen  brokenly. 
"  I've  made  up  my  mind  I  won't  have  Ben  Fielding  if  he 
is  to  separate  us.  What  do  I  care  for  his  money,  and  his 
position,  and  his  honors,  compared  with  my  child  ?  And 
just  as  like  as  not  he  would  despise  me  if  I  didn't  bow 
down  to  him.  I  won't  see  him  again.  You  must  stay 
and  tell  him  the  whole  truth.  There  never  was  such  a 
one  to  speak  the  truth  as  you  are.  And  I  will  go  to 
town  with  the  bundle  of  work." 

Susan  felt  that  her  mother  had  risen  to  the  height  of 
the  moral  sublime.  She  took  her  in  her  arms  and  gave 
her  a  tremendous  hugging  as  she  laughed  and  cried. 
Mrs.  Bowen  did  go  to  town,  and  Susan  saw  the  senator, 
and  they  had  rather  a  bad  half-hour.  Fielding  lost  his 
temper,  and  accused  Susan  of  influencing  her  mother 
against  him  to  her  great  injury.  And  Susan  lost  her 
temper  and  maintained  her  right  to  her  mother  with  per 
tinacity.  And  when  the  senator  went  away  he  congratu 
lated  himself  on  having  escaped  such  a  dragon  of  a 
daughter-in-law.  And  Susan  for  her  part  hated  the 
overbearing  man  worse  than  any  one  she  had  ever  seen. 

Many  can  rise  once  in  a  lifetime  to  the  height  of  the 
moral  sublime,  but  few  can  maintain  themselves  long  at 
such  a  level.  When  the  two  poor  women  took  up  life 
again  in  that  shabby  tenement,  things  were  changed. 
Perhaps  Mrs.  Bowen,  as  is  the  way  with  dependent, 
impulsive  minds,  secretly  regretted  at  moments  all  she 
had  given  up  for  Susan,  while  Susan  for  her  part  saw 
these  feelings  at  work  in  her  mother  and  was  wretched. 
But  one  day  there  came  to  Susan  Bowen  (it  was  while 


268  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS, 

the  spoils  system  still  reigned  triumphant  in  Washington) 
an  official  document  which  announced  her  appointment 
to  a  twelve  hundred  dollar  clerkship  in  the  treasury. 
Though  she  hated  Fielding,  he  had  done  her  this  great 
good  turn  because  that  generous  streak  in  his  nature  was 
marked. 

When  Susan  and  her  mother  went  away  happy  and 
triumphant,  Milly  declared  that  strange  old  fairy,  Truth, 
had  left  the  village  bag  and  baggage. 


CHAPTER  XXIX. 

THE    STORY    OF    JOB    BIRD. 

THE  chestnut  trees  are  in  blossom.  The  hillsides 
show  a  rich  tawny  shade  amid  the  darker  and  lighter 
verdure.  It  is  a  happy  time,  for  one  thinks  instinctively 
of  the  bucolics  and  pastorals  of  the  early  poets,  of  the 
shepherds  and  Arcadians  of  Claude  Lorraine,  and  the 
mountain  slopes  of  Spain  and  Italy.  It  is  the  harvest 
time,  when  the  tanned  hay  and  the  golden  grain  go  down 
before  the  reaper.  Earth  takes  a  richer  tone,  like  some 
rare  porcelain  in  the  potter's  oven.  It  is  colored  all 
through  with  the  life  and  energy  of  the  sun.  The  thick 
trees  seem  to  hold  something  of  night  in  their  branches 
all  day  long. 

There  is  one  farm  on  a  lonely  by-road  under  the  mount 
ain  that  seems  always  to  wear  a  melancholy  look  of 
decay,  even  in  early  spring.  The  place  is  damp,  and  the 
neglected  fruit  trees  are  covered  with  a  kind  of  mold. 
The  red  farm-house  looks  weary  of  standing  so  long  on 
its  foundations,  and  a  row  of  gloomy  poplars  of  the  Lom- 
bardy  variety,  once  very  common  in  this  vicinity,  leads 
down  to  an  unused  gate,  sagging  away  from  its  hinges. 
A  fine  view  of  the  valley  and  opposite  hills  is  entirely 
shut  off  by  the  barn,  and  the  bam  itself  is  now  hidden 
by  a  rank  growth  of  melancholy  verdure.  This  is  Pop 
lar  or  "  Popple  "  Farm.  The  house  for  several  years  has 
been  unoccupied,  and  is  said  by  the  credulous  to  be 
haunted  by  the  ghost  of  Job  Bird,  who  was  killed  in  a 
rather  mysterious  way  in  the  hill  pasture  about  a  mile  dis 
tant.  There  were  no  very  near  neighbors  in  Job  Bird's 


27°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

time,  and  are  not  now  ;  and  a  sinister  look  of  desertion 
and  neglect  has  taken  complete  possession  of  the  place. 
A  few  hardy  flowers  which  Mrs.  Bird  planted  in  her  door- 
yard  have  crept  out  to  the  side  of  the  road,  as  if  they 
would  rather  be  crushed  by  wagon-wheels  or  browsed  by 
cattle  than  remain  in  that  desolate  place.  The  currants 
redden  unplucked  on  the  bushes,  the  cherries  and  apples 
are  left  to  wayfarers  or  wild  birds.  Some  spell  seems  to 
hover  around  the  old  house,  though  its  ghosts  are  only 
the  swallows  in  the  chimney,  which  cause  the  belated 
teamster  to  hurry  past  at  night  with  a  loud  clatter  of 
wheels  to  keep  up  his  courage,  and  send  the  urchin  round 
on  a  side-road  rather  than  pass  the  door. 

And  yet  there  was  no  stain  of  crime  on  Job  Bird  ; 
nothing  worse  than  slight  aberration  of  intellect  and  set 
tled  melancholy,  which  he  seems  to  have  left  as  a  legacy 
to  his  farm.  He  had  rather  a  fair  start  in  life  for  the 
country.  When  young  he  was  considered  a  fortunate 
man.  He  inherited  Popple  farm  free  and  clear  of  debt 
with  all  the  improvements.  There  seemed  nothing  for 
him  to  do  but  go  on  in  the  tracks  of  his  father  and  grand 
father.  It  was  not  a  first-class  farm.  There  was  a  piece 
of  swamp  in  the  valley,  with  a  tract  of  scrub-oak  and 
pine  covering  a  rocky  ridge  which  ran  through  the  cen 
ter  of  the  land.  The  strip  of  arable  and  meadow  along 
the  river  was  narrow,  but  with  self-denial  and  labor  it 
was  possible  to  work  the  farm  and  keep  out  of  debt.  His 
father,  Stephen  Bird,  was  a  terrible,  relentless  worker, 
who  had  crooked  his  back  while  still  young,  kneaded  his 
muscles  into  whip-cord,  and  tanned  his  skin  the  color  of 
mahogany.  When  he  died  the  farm  was  free  from  mort 
gage  or  lien,  and  the  Bird  credit  was  good  at  all  the 
village  "  stores." 

But  Job  was  a  different  sort  of  man.  He  was  imag 
inative,  dreamy,  notional,  given  to  visions  and  prophetic 
moods,  and  with  a  fatal  weakness  of  the  will.  There  was 


A   NATURAL   PROCRAST1NATOR.  271 

little  of  the  stern  stuff  in  his  blood  and  bones  which 
wrests  a  competence  from  the  sand  and  granite  of  a  poor 
farm.  He  dropped  behind  a  little  each  year,  and  before 
many  seasons  had  passed  there  was  a  mortgage  on  the 
land,  and  no  neighbor  would  sell  him  any  thing  except 
for  cash.  He  could  not  co-ordinate  his  headwork  and 
handwork.  He  knew  not  when  to  loiter  and  when  to 
hurry,  when  to  rest  and  when  to  take  up  the  hoe  and 
spade.  He  had  no  method  in  his  work,  a  common  and 
fatal  defect  among  poor  farmers.  His  tools  and  farm 
implements  were  scattered,  and  the  needed  thing 
was  seldom  at  hand.  He  was  a  natural  procrasti- 
nator,  and  could  not  catch  up  with  the  seasons.  His 
plowing,  sowing,  and  planting  were  generally  behind 
hand,  and  the  snow  sometimes  flew  before  he  had  dug 
his  potatoes  or  harvested  his  apples.  He  knew,  per 
haps,  as  well  as  the  most  successful  of  his  neighbors,  all 
the  theories  of  agriculture.  He  was  a  reading  man,  and 
somewhat  more  intelligent  than  the  average,  but  he  could 
not  apply  his  wisdom,  nor  make  good  maxims  tell  upon 
life.  Bird  bewailed  fate,  and  felt  himself  marked  out  for 
misfortune.  The  hail  fell  on  his  fields  of  young  grain, 
the  lightning  struck  his  barn,  the  drought  burned  up  his 
crops,  the  weavil  got  into  his  wheat,  the  potato-bugs  did 
not  spare  him  when  other  people  managed  to  escape 
without  serious  damage.  His  name  Job  was  considered 
too  singularly  appropriate  to  be  due  to  accident. 

On  the  other  hand,  Job  Bird  had  been  blessed  with 
chances  which  if  they  had  come  to  any  other  man  would 
have  made  him  an  object  of  envy.  He  had  not  only  in 
herited  a  fairly  good  farm  free  from  debt,  but  he  had 
married  a  worthy  woman  with  a  little  property  of  her 
own.  Every  body  knew  that  Prissy  Stowe  came  to  Job 
Bird  with  money  in  the  bank.  A  cool,  sequestered,  re 
served  woman  was  Mrs.  Bird,  much  addicted  to  keeping 
her  troubles  to  herself.  Her  long,  pale  face,  with  the 


27 2  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

faded  blue  eyes,  was  crowned  by  a  high  polished  forehead 
and  thin  hair  of  colorless  blonde  brushed  neatly  behind 
the  ears  and  twisted  in  a  close  knot  at  the  back  of  the 
head.  Her  person  was  large  and  clean  and  bony,  and 
the  large  hands  showed  signs  either  of  excessive  labor  or 
of  rheumatism  at  the  enlarged  joints.  She  managed  well 
in  the  house  and  with  that  "  faculty  "  always  admired  in 
country  housekeeping.  The  wheels  of  her  domestic  ma 
chine  were  well  oiled  and  moved  without  jar  or  noise. 
She  used  correct,  rather  elegant  language,  choosing  by 
preference  well  sounding  words.  She  was  careful  of 
appearances,  taking  pains  to  keep  the  best  side  out,  and 
not  to  show  the  seamy  surface  of  life.  That  decent  pride 
with  which  she  strove  to  hide  the  heartache  in  her  breast 
was  of  course  misunderstood.  Some  people  said,  "  Miss 
Bird  was  stuck  up,"  about  the  worst  accusation  that  can 
be  brought  against  such  a  woman  in  -the  rural  districts. 
Still  it  was  set  down  to  her  credit  that  she  taught  her 
children  to  respect  Job  Bird,  and  even  treat  his  defects 
with  a  kind  of  tender  reverence. 

She  always  spoke  of  Job  as  Mr.  Bird,  although  the 
neighbors  had  begun  to  speak  of  him  as  "  old  Bird  "  while 
he  was  still  young.  She  scarcely  ever  made  from  choice 
a  visit  to  any  acquaintance,  for  she  was  a  very  retiring, 
home-keeping  woman  ;  but  the  secret  desire  to  excuse 
her  husband's  shortcoming  and  set  him  right  in  the  eyes 
of  the  world  sometimes  drove  her  abroad.  He  was  suf 
fering  from  lumbago,  and  the  work  had  got  behind  ;  he 
had  failed  to  secure  help,  and  that  long  rainy  spell  had 
nearly  spoiled  the  hay.  In  her  low,  precise  voice,  every 
word  grammatically  correct,  she  generally  wound  up  by 
saying  she  was  so  glad  Mr.  Bird  was  a  steady  man,  a 
home-keeper,  with  no  bad  habits.  If  Mr.  Bird  were  a 
drinking  man,  like  some  she.  knew,  she  would  consider 
herself  a  most  unhappy  woman.  And  then  she  would 
take  her  way  home  with  the  hope  in  her  heart  that  she  had 


DO  NOT  GRIND    YOUR   SEED-CORN.  273 

made  folks  believe  Job  was  not  to  blame  for  his  bad 
management,  but  a  victim  of  the  conspiracy  of  nature. 
But  the  country  people  have  very  sharp  eyes  for  the  Job 
Bird  class  of  men,  and  their  judgments  are  often  hard  and 
pitiless.  They  wondered  if  "  Miss  "  Bird  was  making 
believe,  pretending  that  she  did  not  know  all  about  the 
man  she  had  married,  and  thought  she  could  pull  the 
wool  over  their  eyes. 

If  she  knew,  she  also  loved  and  pitied,  and  the  deceits 
of  such  a  heart  are  indeed  pious  frauds.  She  strove  to 
keep  Job  tidy  and  respectable  in  appearance,  with  his 
clothes  well  mended  and  brushed.  But  he  was  a  slouch 
about  his  person  as  he  was  about  his  land.  There  is  an 
old  adage  which  says  you  must  not  grind  your  seed-corn. 
Job  Bird  was  always  grinding  away  at  his  seed-corn.  He 
worked  prodigiously  at  the  wrong  time,  and  then  idled 
away  important  days  in  the  woods.  He  had  always  been 
a  great  dreamer,  and  sometimes  he  endeavored  to  fore 
tell  future  events  from  dreams  or  from  other  signs  ; 
but  his  predictions  never  came  out  right,  and  even  his  wife 
refused  to  treat  them  seriously.  He  had  thoughts  of  set 
ting  up  for  a  weather  prophet  and  making  an  almanac 
with  startling  weather  predictions,  but  all  it  ever  came  to 
was  the  construction  of  a  queer,  meaningless  diagram  on 
a  piece  of  board,  which  for  many  years  went  knocking 
about  the  barn.  •  About  harvest-time  he  was  always 
troubled  with  a  vision  of  the  Apocalyptic  beast,  which  he 
tried  to  draw  with  a  bit  of  chalk  on  the  rocks  and  fences. 
This  diagram,  composed  mainly  of  tail  and  nippers,  was 
called  by  the  boys  of  the  neighborhood  the  Apoplexy 
beast,  and  a  superstitious  feeling  grew  up  about  it.  The 
boys  did  not  dare  rub  it  out,  and  in  their  fancy  it  soon 
took  on  the  horns,  hoofs  and  tail  of  Burns's  "  Auld  Nickie- 
ben." 

It  was  about  the  time  the  "  Apoplexy  beast"  first  ap 
peared  that  folks,  going  back  in  memory,  called  to  mind 


274  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

that  Job's  great-aunt,  Hepsy  Fairbairn,  had  been  insane 
and  died  in  a  hospital.  They  predicted  that  he  would  go 
the  same  way.  He  was  often  under  the  influence  of  hal 
lucinations  and  imagined  the  whole  of  nature  in  an 
attitude  of  unfriendliness.  The  trees  mocked  him,  the 
clouds  made  faces,  things  stole  out  of  the  woods  after 
him  at  night,  and  mewed  and  barked  like  cats  and  dogs. 
The  whole  farm  seemed  haunted,  and  an  emanation  of 
this  feeling  spread  to  the  neighbors.  He  might  be  seen 
swinging  his  arms  as  he  walked  over  the  land  and  talked 
to  himself.  His  only  reading  now  was  the  Book  of  Daniel, 
which  he  carried  with  him  in  his  pocket.  His  mind  was 
always  at  work  on  the  problem  of  the  end  of  the  world, 
and  it  was  rumored  he  had  made  his  own  ascension  robe 
out  of  unbleached  cotton,  and  hidden  it  in  the  shed-loft 
in  readiness  for  the  great  and  awful  day,  quite  indiffer 
ent  as  to  the  ascension  robes  of  other  people.  It  was 
even  said  that  Job  believed  he  was  the  only  one  to  be 
caught  up  to  heaven  in  that  vicinity  when  Gabriel's 
trump  should  blow,  wherefore  the  great  significance  of 
the  unbleached  cotton  robe.  In  those  first  years,  when 
the  Second-Advent  mania  had  taken  possession  of  Job, 
the  end  of  the  world  seemed  so  near  it  was  manifestly 
useless  to  do  much  planting  or  sowing,  plowing  or 
hoeing  on  the  farm,  and  gradually  he  gave  up  work 
of  every  kind,  and  left  the  management  of  the  land  to 
his  wife  and  a  hired  man. 

There  was  a  shadow  over  the  old  house,  naturally 
gloomy  enough,  and  as  the  children  grew  up  they  escaped 
at  an  early  age  to  where  they  could  have  a  little  more 
sunlight,  and  freer  expression  for  their  young  lives. 
The  boys  sought  their  fortunes  in  the  West.  The  girls 
married  or  taught  school  at  a  distance.  Job  Bird  and 
his  wife  were  growing  old  before  their  time.  He  was  a 
harmless  monomaniac,  having  gone,  just  as  people  pre 
dicted  he  would,  the  way  of  his  Great-aunt  Hepsy. 


THE    WHITE  MYSTIC  STONE.  275 

Still  Mrs.  Bird  insisted  on  keeping  him  at  home  and  let 
ting  him  roam  about  the  farm  at  his  own  will  Thin  and 
bloodless,  with  his  clothes  hanging  loosely  upon  his 
shrunken  limbs,  he  slipped  through  the  daylight  like  a 
shadow.  She,  though  erect  still  and  keeping  her  cor 
rect  forms  of  speech,  was  very  pale,  with  hair  like  the 
snow.  She  did  not  now  go  about  among  the  neighbors 
to  excuse  Mr.  Bird's  shortcomings. 

But  the  old  man  grew  dearer  to  her  in  proportion  as 
he  grew  more  dependent  and  helpless.  His  insanity  was 
of  so  mild  a  form  she  was  never  afraid  he  would  harm 
any  human  creature  or  even  a  bird.  Her  little  money 
in  the  bank  had  long  been  exhausted,  and  now  she  let 
part  of  the  land  on  shares,  and  part  she  worked  with  the 
aid  of  hired  help,  and  her  children  supplied  means  by 
which  the  old  place  was  kept  in  the  family.  Job  roamed 
and  roamed  all  over  the  farm,  with  that  tyrannous  rest 
lessness  symptomatic  of  the  diseased  brain.  He  watched 
the  birds  and  small  creatures  for  hours,  and  talked  to 
them  in -a  kind  of  gibberish  which  he  thought  they  could 
understand. 

About  two  years  before  his  death  he  read  in  Reve 
lations  of  a  clear,  white,  mystic  stone,  and  a  thought 
came  to  him  that  perhaps  by  diligent  search  a  piece 
of  this  stone  might  be  found  on  the  old  farm  to  re 
veal  to  him  those  things  he  had  vainly  sought  in  dreams, 
in  the  shapes  of  clouds,  and  all  manner  of  foolish  auguries. 
This  notion  coming  to  his  poor  confused  brain  seemed  to 
give  him  a  new  purpose  in  life.  He  confided  it  to  his 
wife  in  great  secrecy,  and  seemed  to  ask  her  sympathy 
and  her  faith  with  dumb  signs,  mainly  through  the  eager, 
pathetic  look  of  the  eyes.  This  return  to  something  like 
the  old  affection  and  trust  of  their  youth  was  to  her  like 
the  opening  of  a  well  of  sweet  water.  Her  children  were 
all  out  in  the  world  struggling  as  they  best  might,  and 
she,  a  reserved  woman  by  nature  and  much  tried,  was 


276  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

very  lonely.  But  now  her  weak-minded  husband,  after 
stumbling  on  dark  mountains  for  a  long  time,  had  come 
back  to  lean  upon  her  in  a  trustful  second  childhood. 
She  would  often  watch  him  from  the  door  or  window, 
going  over  the  fields,  his  head  bent,  feeling  neither  rain 
nor  sun,  wind  nor  cold,  nor  burning  heat,  in  quest  of  that 
stone  which  was  to  let  him  into  the  secret  of  life.  The 
delusion,  crazy  as  it  might  be,  was  appealing  and  pathetic, 
and  sometimes  she  almost  believed  there  might  be  some 
thing  in  his  fancies.  With  the  craft  of  the  insane,  he 
watched  her  narrowly,  to  detect  the  first  glimmer  of  doubt 
in  her  mind.  He  gathered  a  great  number  of  little  stones, 
of  all  sizes  and  shapes  and  colors,  which  he  sorted  and 
laid  away  on  the  shelf  in  the  barn.  Some  of  these  he  tried 
to  polish  with  rags  and  bits  of  newspaper,  but  they  always 
disappointed  him  in  the  end.  None  were  of  the  perfect 
form,  or  of  that  crystalline  clearness  through  which  Job 
imagined  his  eye  could  pierce  the  future. 

His  wife  humored  him  ;  she  let  him  think  she  believed 
in  the  possibility  of  finding  the  stone,  that  he  might  con 
fide  in  her  more  and  more.  When  tired  out  with  his  quest, 
he  would  occasionally  come  into  the  sitting-room  and  rest 
on  the  lounge  near  where  she  sat  at  work  in  the  long 
summer  afternoons.  Thus  lying  on  his  back,  with  the  tips 
of  the  fingers  of  the  two  hands  put  lightly  together  over 
his  breast,  his  eyes  fixed  on  vacancy,  his  lips  moved  in- 
audibly,  while  his  forehead  was  corrugated  under  his  white 
hair  with  the  intensity  of  his  thought.  "  He  is  always 
studying,"  said  the  old  wife  to  herself;  and  she  wondered 
what  he  had  in  his  mind.  She  recalled  stories  she  had 
read  of  the  philosopher's  stone,  which  turns  every  thing 
it  touches  to  gold,  of  strange  talismanic  stones  that  reveal 
the  true  nature  of  all  things,  and  of  those  mystic  stones, 
urim  and  thummim,  the  Jewish  high  priest  wore  on  his 
garment. 

"  What   good    will    the  stone   do  you,  father,    if  you 


THE  GREAT  BOWLDER.  277 

should  happen  to  find  it  ? "  she  would  ask.  "  It  will 
reveal  what  is  hidden,"  was  his  invariable  answer. 
Whether  this  hidden  thing  were  the  secret  of  happiness 
or  knowledge  of  future  events,  he  would  never  say  ;  but 
he  was  positive  that  the  stone  existed  somewhere  on  the 
old  farm,  and  might  probably  be  found  with  diligent 
search.  He  never  strayed  out  of  the  bounds,  or  gave 
trouble  to  any  one,  but  thus  wandered  and  sought  and 
picked  up  stones  and  talked  endlessly  to  himself.  Near 
the  center  of  the  farm  a  ridge  of  granite  rock  crops  out 
in  a  low  hill  crowned  with  a  few  young  firs  and  birches 
thinly  scattered  along  its  top.  A  huge  bowlder,  one  of 
those  great  traveled  masses  which  had  come  down  in  the 
glacial  period,  lay  bedded  in  soil  on  the  western  slope  of 
this  ridge.  In  its  crannies  had  gathered  a  crop  of  ever 
green  ferns,  mosses,  and  lichens,  and  a  stalwart  young 
ash  had  rooted  itself  in  one  of  the  deeper  clefts.  Old 
Job  Bird  had  gone  over  the  stony  ground  all  about  the 
bowlder  again  and  again,  when  it  occurred  to  him  to  try 
and  move  the  half-detached  mass  of  rock  through  which 
the  roots  of  the  ash  tree  had  worked  their  way.  He  did 
not  let  Prissy  know  what  he  was  about.  His  cunning 
told  him  she  would  not  approve  this  herculean  labor.  So 
he  dug  and  dug  about  that  side  of  the  bowlder  where  it 
was  weakest,  trusting  that  some  heavy  rain-storm  would 
give  him  the  help  he  required  to  set  it  in  motion  down 
the  hill.  For  two  or  three  weeks  he  worked  faithfully  at 
dislodging  the  bowlder  in  that  distant  pasture,  where  the 
silence  was  only  broken  by  birds,  and  by  the  gambols  of 
young  heifers  that  looked  at  him  with  shy,  wild  eyes. 

One  warm  July  day  Job  did  not  come  home  to  the 
mid-day  meal.  His  wife  thought  little  of  it  at  the  time, 
for  the  old  man's  habits  were  always  irregular.  But 
when  a  severe  storm  came  up  in  the  course  of  the  after 
noon,  and  the  lightning  flashed,  and  the  thunder  cracked 
bodefully  among  the  hills,  Mrs.  Bird  fella  prey  to  intense 


278  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

anxiety.  She  could  hardly  tell  why,  for  Job  did  not 
mind  cold  or  wet,  and  often  was  abroad  in  snow  and  rain 
with  seeming  enjoyment  in  the  wildest  weather.  But 
this  was  an  exceptional  storm  and  almost  tropical  in  the 
volume  of  its  rainfall.  Great  sheets  of  water  poured 
down  from  the  clouds  for  two  hours,  and  built  a  solid 
wall  between  the  lonely  woman  and  the  outer  world. 
When  it  cleared  away  with  sudden  relenting,  the  low  sun 
looked  out  from  diffused  gold  under  a  heavy  eyebrow  of 
blue-black  cloud,  and  the  roads  and  paths  ran  with 
gurgling  brown  brooks  ;  the  trees  and  bushes  glittered 
with  untold  splendor,  and  the  corn  was  lodged  and  some 
of  the  fences  blown  down,  and  the  river  in  places  had 
overrun  its  banks  and  washed  the  cocked  hay  of  low 
meadows  down  stream. 

Mrs.  Bird  took  her  way  through  the  bars  of  the  cattle- 
yard  and  across  the  wet  fields,  unmindful  of  the  destruc 
tion  of  her  crops.  She  was  worried  about  her  husband, 
and  when  she  got  beyond  the  home  acre  and  reached  the 
mowing  lot  she  stopped  and  called,  but  only  the  cawing 
of  a  crow  that  flapped  its  wings  lazily  in  the  strange  yel 
low  light  over  the  west  wood  answered  her  cry.  On  she 
went,  striking  into  the  rocky  pasture,  where  the  soil  was 
poor  and  in  spots  red  with  sorrel.  She  cast  her  eyes  on 
the  great  bowlder  half-way  down  the  slope  ;  something 
had  happened  to  it  ;  had  the  storm  broken  off  a  large 
fragment  and  carried  it  down  in  a  sudden  flood  from  the 
hills  ?  Her  heart  grew  sick,  and  suddenly  she  felt  her 
limbs  giving  way,  and  she  fell  with  a  moan,  and  then  got 
upon  her  knees  and  crept  forward.  The  cleft  bowlder 
had  rolled  from  its  foundation,  and  in  some  mysterious 
way  had  fallen  upon  Job  Bird  and  carried  him  partly 
down  the  slope,  where  it  left  him  crushed  and  quite  dead. 
They  never  knew  just  how  the  bowlder  fell  upon  the  old 
man,  who  possibly  had  taken  shelter  under  it  from  the 
storm.  But  when  they  gathered  him  up  a  little  smooth 


HIDDEN    THINGS  REVEALED.  279 

white  pebble,  round  and  shining,  such  as  David  chose 
from  the  brook  wherewith  to  smite  Goliath,  was  closely 
clasped  in  his  hand.  Perhaps  at  the  very  moment  the 
bowlder  fell  upon  him  he  believed  he  had  found  the  mys 
tic  talisman.  And,  strangely  enough,  at  that  moment 
death  came,  and  hidden  things  were  revealed  to  the  old 
man's  eyes.  That  infinite  of  being  which  we  call  death 
opened  before  him,  and  perhaps  perfect  sanity  and  sweet 
reason  came  to  wash  away  the  confusion  of  the  distracted 
brain. 

People  wondered  that  "  Miss  "  Bird  seemed  to  mourn 
for  a  crazy  man — a  man  who,  when  in  his  right  mind  had 
been  of  so  little  use  to  the  world.  But  who  can  measure 
the  height  and  depth  of  such  a  woman's  nature,  that 
loves  the  more  the  more  the  object  of  her  love  is  poor, 
despised,  helpless,  and  dependent  ? 


CHAPTER  XXX. 

THE    OLD    TAVERN-STAND. 

crickets  are  singing  in  the  stubble  and  the  grass- 
1  hoppers  leaping  in  the  hot  noon.  It  is  the  time 
when  scarlet  and  white  poppies  blow  in  the  village  gar 
dens,  those  mystic  oriental  flowers  with  satin  petals, 
moved  by  the  slightest  breeze.  The  August  noons  seem 
poppy-drugged,  so  silent  are  all  the  dusty  roadsides. 

At  this  season  the  little  finch  of  the  common  yellow 
variety  flutters  about  the  edges  of  fields  and  along  the 
road  to  pick  up  the  seeds  that  fall  from  fruits  and  flowers. 
They  have  their  romances — those  pretty  creatures,  their 
little  coquetries  and  flirtations.  Their  flight  is  a  bird 
play  set  to  music,  and  I  have  often  thought  the  motion 
of  their  wings  inscribed  on  the  air  the  stanzas  of  a  poem. 

The  shorn  fields,  with  their  grouped  elms,  look  very 
peaceful  lying  about  the  old  tavern-stand  close  to  the 
road  on  the  south  side  of  the  town,  some  mile  or  more 
from  the  center  of  the  village.  It  is  still  called  the  old 
tavern,  though  there  has  not  been  a  tavern  kept  there  for 
half  a  century. 

This  silvery  pile  of  ancient  building  constitutes  a  com 
posite  dwelling,  with  shed,  milk-house,  and  carriage-house 
under  the  roof.  Fifty  or  sixty  years  ago  it  was  the  most 
celebrated  house  of  call  on  the  turnpike.  It  stands  at  a 
fork  of  the  road — that  place  where  man  and  beast  are 
supposed  invariably  to  need  refreshment  and  a  genial 
innkeeper's  hearty  welcome.  Two  gigantic  elms  rise  in 
front  of  the  door,  and  throw  a  broad  shade  over  the 
porch  where  teamsters,  peddlers,  commercial  travelers, 


THE   OLD  SIGN  PULLED  DOWN.  281 

and  tourists  journeying  in  their  own  conveyances  from 
town  to  town,  formerly  sat  to  rest  and  gossip,  and  sip  a 
glass  of  something  strengthening  from  the  neighboring 
bar.  The  shade  of  those  great  towering  elms,  and  the 
good  cheer  for  which  the  house  was  long  famous,  were 
lures  to  the  weary  traveler  along  the  turnpike.  The 
tavern-keeper  was  both  host  and  farmer,  and  made  as 
much  from  his  broad  acres  as  from  the  profits  of  his 
house. 

But  there  came  a  time  when  the  last  tavern-keeper 
died  childless,  and  the  farm  was  sold  to  a  new-comer, 
who  pulled  down  the  creaking  old  sign  fastened  to 
a  limb  of  one  of  the  elm  trees,  and  began  a  whole  series 
of  innovations,  both  within  and  without.  The  low-stud 
ded  main  part  was  raised.  The  tap-room  was  turned  into 
a  parlor.  The  old  ball-room,  with  its  "  spring  floor,"  was 
cut  up  into  a  range  of  bedrooms.  Part  of  the  horse-sheds 
were  torn  down,  and  other  changes  ensued,  until  the 
whole  was  fitted  for  an  extensive  dairy  farm.  For  two 
or  three  years,  it  was  said,  all  the  peddlers'  carts,  team 
sters',  and  itinerants'  horses  and  dogs  turned  of  themselves 
up  to  the  old  stand,  and  with  difficulty  could  be  convinced 
that  it  was  no  longer  a  house  of  entertainment.  Old 
guests  of  the  place,  who  had  not  been  that  way  for  years, 
would  halt  at  the  door  in  expectation  of  welcome,  and 
seeing  no  smiling  publican,  and  no  sign  hung  under  the 
elm  boughs,  would  depart  sadly,  shaking  their  heads  over 
changed  times  and  the  decay  of  good  old  customs.  But 
in  my  time,,  when  I  first  remember  the  place,  only  the 
tradition  of  the  tavern  remained. 

The  place  was  then  owned  by  Josiah  Belknap,  and  there 
was  no  Mrs.  Josiah.  To  the  children  he  seemed  even 
then  an  old  man,  for  he  had  grown  gray  very  young.  But 
Josiah  was  serene  and  smiling,  always  lifted  up  in  an  at 
mosphere  of  calm  above  the  chatter  of  the  women.  It 
was  a  saying  of  Josiah's  that  he  never  minded  the  talk 


282  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

of  women.  Geese  must  cackle,  and  women  must  talk. 
They  would  die  if  they  were  deprived  of  this  vent  for  the 
nerves,  but  it  is  the  duty  of  the  wise  man  to  go  his  way 
and  leave  them  to  settle  all  questions  among  themselves  ; 
but  it  was  said  in  such  a  gentle,  placid  voice,  and  with  such 
a  benevolent  countenance,  no  one  ever  thought  of  taking 
offense.  Although  Josiah  had  never  married,  protesting 
he  had  no  genius  for  matrimony,  he  had  a  great  deal  to 
do  with  women  all  his  life,  and  must  have  been  deeply 
versed  in  feminine  lore.  His  mother  and  grandmother 
on  the  father's  side  lived  with  him  until  they  both  died  of 
extreme  old  age.  These  were  Granny  Barnes,  as  she  was 
always  called,  and  Mother  Belknap.  Granny  Barnes  was 
also  known  among  the  sect  of  Quakers  to  which  she  be 
longed  as  plain  Betsey  Barnes.  And  Granny  would  not 
condescend  to  put  a  handle  to  any  body's  name,  not  even 
to  the  president's  ;  she  would  have  called  the  Father  of  his 
Country  George,  with  a  dignity  all  her  own.  She  used 
the  plain  language,  which  is  so  sweet  and  winsome  on  the 
lips  of  the  old.  In  spite  of  thequietistic  doctrines  which 
absorbed  into  the  nature  make  a  heavenly  serenity  around 
many  Friends,  Betsey  Barnes  still  showed,  even  in  her 
extreme  old  age,  the  rigid,  severe,  and  rather  unyielding 
temper  which  had  been  her  inheritance.  Grace  had 
worked  upon  the  craggy  outlines,  producing  the  effect  of 
strength,  dignity,  and  calm  self-poise.  She  was  very  tall 
and  spare,  with  a  joint  somewhere  about  the  middle  of 
her  person,  which  gave  way  when  she  sat  down,  and  left 
her  as  rigid  and  erect  as  before.  She  had  been  a  preacher 
in  her  sect,  and  a  person  of  authority,  and  she  always 
carried  the  preacher  about  with  her. 

Her  muslin  and  dove-color  were  of  the  neatest  and 
most  particular  shade  and  fiber.  Her  thin,  gaunt  head 
was  covered  with  a  close  semi-transparent  cap  that 
showed  the  scant  gray  hair.  She  sat  a  great  deal  in  her 
old  age  in  a  high-backed  chair  with  her  hands  folded 


THE   DEBATABLE  LAND.  283 

over  her  drab  gown,  saying  she  was  waiting  for  the  sum 
mons.  Still,  though  Granny  Barnes  thought  she  had  got 
mainly  through  with  life,  she  did  take  a  keen  interest  in 
temporal  affairs,  especially  in  the  affairs  of  her  grandson, 
Josiah,  whom  she  hoped  to  save  from  falling  too  much 
under  the  influence  of  Celindy  Belknap.  We  are  all  of 
us  at  times  in  danger  of  mistaking  the  voice  of  our  own 
prejudices  for  that  still  small  voice  which  the  prophet 
celebrates,  and  which  the  good  Friends  claim  to  hear 
sounding  in  the  depths  of  the  soul.  Granny  Barnes  had 
a  passionate,  intense  nature,  and  though  she  strove  to 
subdue  it  to  the  pattern  of  her  sect,  the  imperious  will 
sometimes  spoke  out. 

Mother  Belknap,  on  the  other  hand,  though  she  held 
firmly  to  those  "blessed  "  doctrines  of  election  and  total 
depravity,  was  a  trim,  blithe  little  person,  not  decayed  so 
much  as  well  dried,  with  a  stereotyped  bloom  on  her 
cheek,  and  a  quick,  light  step.  Each  of  the  old  women 
occupied  one  of  those  large  apartments  which  had  been 
made  out  of  the  ancient  ball-room.  A  middle  apart 
ment  lay  between  them,  their  common  sitting-room, 
where  they  daily  met  to  make  polite  inquiries  after  each 
other's  health,  and  how  each  had  passed  the  night. 
Here,  too,  they  sometimes  engaged  in  religious  discus 
sion  on  controverted  points,  and  the  debatable  land  wit 
nessed  many  a  little  word-battle  when  they  cast  Bible 
texts  at  each  other's  heads,  and  each  withdrew  to  her 
own  room  with  ruffled  feathers,  but  the  triumphant  sense 
of  victory. 

Granny  Barnes's  room  was  the  outward  expression  of 
her  faith — calm,  shady,  spotlessly  neat,  with  polished 
bits  of  ancient  furniture,  a  few  drab-looking  books  piled 
up  in  solemn  iciness,  strips  of  carpet  before  the  bed  and 
bureau,  immaculate  dimity  window  curtains,  and  bed 
curtains  of  the  same,  edged  with  knotted  fringe  ;  but  no 
picture,  no  flower-pot,  nothing  but  prim  starched  neat- 


284  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

ness  and  quietude.  Children  seldom  strayed  into  Granny 
Barnes's  room,  although  they  sometimes  peeped  slyly  in 
at  the  door.  But  Mother  Belknap,  though  she  held  such 
portentous  doctrines  as  to  the  ultimate  fate  of  the  human 
race,  loved  children,  especially  babies,  knew  all  about 
their  ailments,  and  was  perfectly  instructed  in  baby  talk, 
in  how  to  trot,  and  dandle,  and  croon  nursery-songs,  so 
that  young  mothers  instinctively  brought  their  little  ones 
to  her,  to  lie  on  her  great  bed  and  be  cradled  in  her 
maternal  arms. 

Mother  Belknap  loved  brightness,  and  cheeriness,  and 
bustle.  Her  room,  I  well  remember,  was  done  up  with 
much  high-colored  chintz  representing  wreaths  of  red 
roses  and  yellow  and  blue  birds.  A  string  of  gold  beads 
encircled  her  neck,  and  she  snuffed  judiciously  out  of  a 
pretty  tortoise-shell  box.  It  was  the  fashion  in  her  time 
to  wear  a  large  bow  on  the  front  of  the  mob  cap  called  a 
windmill.  Mother  Belknap's  windmill  was  always  made 
of  bright  colors,  and  her  gowns  and  aprons  partook  of 
the  same  cheery  glow.  Long  after  Granny  Barnes  had 
taken  to  walking  with  a  cane,  Mother  Belknap  was  quite 
active,  and  she  thanked  God  that  she  preserved  her  sight 
and  hearing,  as  any  one  who  believed  so  implicitly  in  the 
doctrine  of  election  should.  She  could  thread  a  cam 
bric  needle  without  "  specs  "  long  after  Granny  Barnes 
had  ceased  to  sew  or  even  knit.  But  it  was  a  secret 
scandal  to  Granny  Barnes,  this  unmannerly  display  of 
cheerful  worldliness  on  the  part  of  Celinda  Belknap,  who 
held  with  such  stubbornness  to  the  doom  of  the  greater 
part  of  mankind,  and  seemed  to  enjoy  the  idea.  Celinda 
Belknap  had  added  the  enormity  of  saying,  in  so  many 
words,  that  she  did  not  believe  in  drab  angels  and  saints, 
and  very  much  doubted  whether  they  spoke  the  plain 
language  in  heaven. 

It  was  for  the  soul  of  Josiah,  the  son  and  grandson, 
that  these  two  ancient  dames  contended.  Josiah,  though 


JO  SI  Airs  RELIGION.  285 

he  had  passed  through  a  religious  experience  at  a  certain 
period  of  his  life,  strange  to  say,  had  never  joined  a 
church.  He  owned  to  his  conversion  with  a  kind  of 
childlike  simplicity,  but  he  would  never  state  his  exact 
theological  views,  or  make  any  explicit  confession  on 
doctrinal  points,  especially  that  one  so  dear  to  his 
mother's  heart,  foreordination  and  election.  Still,  Josiah 
never  blinked  the  fact  that  he  was  a  religious  man,  deeply 
interested  in  spiritual  concerns.  The  music  of  the  parish 
received  great  help  from  Josiah,  who  had  a  natural  gift 
in  that  direction,  and  could  play  quite  sweetly  on  several 
instruments  by  ear,  never  having  taken  a  lesson  in  his 
life.  He  confessed  that  his  best  seasons  of  prayer  and 
meditation  were  in  the  morning  alone  in  the  fields,  when 
the  catbird  and  song  sparrow  made  the  air  tremble  with 
melody,  and  the  dew  lay  white  on  the  grass.  Then  things 
unutterable  stole  into  Josiah's  heart,  and  since,  like 
Burns,  he  could  not  go  into  the  little  square  chamber 
with  the  wooden  table  and  pour  his  feelings  all  out  in 
immortal  verse,  he  would  sometimes  drop  his  hoe  and 
come  directly  in  from  the  fields,  and  seat  himself  at  an 
old  reed  organ  in  his  own  vast  chamber,  and  pour  out  an 
improvisation  which  seemed  to  express  every  thing.  I 
can  see  him  now,  the  beautiful  old  bachelor,  so  unworldly 
and  gentle,  so  oblivious  to  his  own  good  deeds,  his  self- 
sacrificing  life,  and  untiring  patience  with  those  old 
dependent  people,  and  all  about  him,  as  he  sat  at  the 
organ,  his  healthful,  calm  face  with  a  slight  bloom  upon 
it,  delicate  as  a  woman's  in  feature,  with  the  long  sil 
very  hair  almost  touching  his  shoulder. 

Granny  Barnes  had  been  partially  deaf  for  many  years, 
but  Mother  Belknap  prided  herself  on  her  good  hearing, 
a  fact  which  Granny  Barnes  always  ignored  in  speaking 
to  her.  "  You  needn't  scream  so,"  Mother  Belknap 
would  say,  with  as  much  asperity  as  is  conformable  with 
perfect  politeness.  "  I  have  my  hearing,  thank  heaven, 


286  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

good  as  ever.  Folks  as  haven't  their  hearing  think 
every  body  else  deef  as  posts.  I  am  sorry  to  see  you 
don't  hear  nigh  as  quick  as  you  did  last  year." 

Granny  Barnes  generally  shut  her  eyes  and  remained 
rigid  under  this  infliction,  and  as  it  is  very  difficult  to 
talk  to  a  person  who  insists  on  keeping  her  eyes  closed, 
and  who  is  as  you  know  deaf  as  a  stone-wall  when  she  does 
not  choose  to  hear,  Mother  Belknap  generally  gave  up, 
tacitly  defeated.  In  a  day  or  two  Granny  Barnes  would 
hold  a  secret  interview  with  Josiah  :  "  I  think  I  ought  to 
tell  thee,  Josiah,  that  thy  mother  is  failing.  It  is  borne 
in  on  my  mind  that  she  is  growing  childish.  Thee  may 
have  noticed  that  she  wears  a  pink  lutestring  windmill 
on  her  cap.  I  must  bear  my  testimony  against  such 
worldliness.  I  tell  thee  I  am  forced  to  shut  my  eyes 
when  I  see  those  pink  lutestrings." 

"  Mother  always  was  fond  of  bright  colors,"  Josiah 
would  answer,  "  and  that  kind  of  weakness  grows  on 
folks  as  they  get  old  ;  but  it  is  more  harmless,  ain't  it, 
granny,  than  harsh  judgments  and  uncharitabieness  ?  " 

"  Thee  is  right,  Josiah,  and  I  am  rebuked." 

"  No,  granny  ;  but  we  must  bear  and  forbear  with  one 
another,  having  patience,  and  long-suffering,  and  broth 
erly  love."  Thus  he  poured  oil  on  the  troubled  waters, 
only  to  be  waylaid  by  his  mother.  "  Have  you  noticed, 
Josiah,  how  granny  is  breaking  up  ?  She's  harder  of 
hearing  than  she  was,  and  she  don't  seem  to  sense  things 
quick,  but  still  she  is  pretty  techy.  The  old  lady  is  all 
going  to  pieces.  I  thought  you  ought  to  know  it,  Josiah, 
so  it  shouldn't  come  upon  you  unbeknownst.  But  it  is 
strange  how  obstinate  she  is.  She  holds  to  free  grace  in 
the  face  of  all  reason  and  of  Scriptur'.  I  hate  to  see  her 
so  sot  in  her  own  delusion." 

"  Don't  worry  about  that,  mother.  There  may  be 
more  ways  than  one." 

"  There  ain't  but  one  way,  Josiah.     It's  an  awful  and 


MOTHER  BELKNAP"  S  SHEPHERD.      287 

solemn  fact.  You  can't  climb  up  the  sheepfold  on  the 
wrong  side.  Straight  is  the  road  and  narrer  is  the  way, 
and  few  there  be  that  find  it.  Many  are  called,  but  few 
are  chosen,  Josiah,"  laying  the  fore-finger  of  one  hand  in 
the  palm  of  the  other. 

"  Well,  if  it  gives  you  any  comfort  to  think  so,  mother, 
I  am  glad,  but  I  don't  quite  see  how  you  can  be  so 
cheerful  under  the  circumstances.  As  for  granny,  you 
couldn't  get  along  without  her,  mother,  she  makes  you 
feel  so  safe  and  comfortable." 

The  old  lady  looked  at  him  half-puzzled,  half-resent 
ful.  "  Josiah,"  she  would  say,  warningly,  "  I  do  hope  you 
are  not  going  to  let  her  get  the  upper  hand.  You  have 
been  converted,  and  you  know  you  have  got  grace  in 
your  soul." 

"  Yes,  I  think  I  have,  mother,  at  least  sometimes, 
though  it  is  a  conceited  thing  to  say." 

Mother  Belknap  had  her  favorite  spiritual  shepherd,  a 
rank  Calvinist,  whom  she  always  entertained  in  her  own 
room,  coddling  him  with  seed-cakes  and  a  favorite  drink 
of  her  decoction  called  metheglin.  Granny  Barnes  was 
excluded  from  these  conferences  and  seasons  of  soul- 
refreshing  as  being  heretical.  On  one  of  these  visits 
Josiah  was  at  work  binding  grain  behind  the  barn.  The 
parson  thought  it  might  be  a  fit  moment  to  try  and  get  a 
doctrinal  statement  from  him,  and  Mother  Belknap 
trotted  out  into  the  field  to  hold  a  religious  talk  with  her 
son.  "  Josiah,"  she  began,  as  if  speaking  of  the  state  of 
the  crops,  u  when  was  you  converted  ?  Brother  Brewster 
here  would  like  to  know." 

Josiah  was  always  respectful  to  his  mother  and  very 
patient.  He  was  one  who  honored  the  ministry  and  was 
much  given  to  entertaining  the  saints.  But  now  the 
spirit  of  a  man  rebelled  within  him  against  this  effort  to 
pry  into  the  most  sacred  part  of  his  experience. 

"  Go  and  ask  God,   Brother  Brewster,"  said  Josiah, 


288  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

without  stopping  his  work.  "  He  knows  all  about  it — 
and  you  are  very  intimate  with  Him,  judging  from  the  way 
you  preach  and  pray.  Go  and  ask  Him." 

The  parson  went  home  much  offended,  and  might 
never  have  taken  Josiah  back  into  his  good  graces  but 
for  the  comfortable  beds  and  excellent  cheer  at  the  old 
tavern  house.  Granny  Barnes,  of  course,  heard  of  the 
rebuke  Josiah  had  administered  to  the  parson — "  the  hire 
ling  priest,  who  preached  in  a  steeple-house  " — for  it 
was  a  peculiarity  of  her  deafness  that  she  always  heard 
every  thing  she  wished  to  hear. 

"  Thee  sees,"  she  said  calmly  to  his  discomfited 
mother,  "  Josiah  after  all  belongs  to  my  side  of  the 
family.  His  father  strayed  off  and  married  out  of  the 
meeting,  much  to  the  grief  of  all  who  had  his  good  at 
heart  ;  but  Josiah  is  one  of  us.  Thee  can  see  it  in  his 
life.  He  is  a  natural  peacemaker,  but  he  won't  be  im 
posed  on.  His  music  is  all  peace.  It  is  nearer  quiet 
ness  than  any  sound  I  ever  heard.  Thee  knows  we  bear 
testimony  against  worldly  music,  and  all  that  goes  with 
it,  but  I  call  Josiah's  music  heavenly." 

Such  praise  of  Josiah  could  not  placate  Mother  ^el- 
knap.  "  You  mean  that  Josiah  belongs  to  his  father's 
side,  and  that  I  haven't  any  part  in  my  own  son." 

"  I  wouldn't  say  that,  Celinda  Belknap,  for  thee  knows 
that  though  Josiah  is  such  a  peaceable  man,  with  such 
quietness  of  nature,  he  is  an  obstinate  man.  And  thee 
can  tell  where  his  obstinacy  comes  from." 

Josiah's  sister,  Mrs.  Phoebe  Elderkin,  had  been 
widowed  young,  and  had  come  to  live  with  him,  bring 
ing  her  three  children.  Josiah  never  complained  of  the 
added  burden  of  this  family.  He  brought  up  the  Elderkin 
children,  and  saw  them  well  started  in  life.  It  was  just 
at  this  point,  when  his  mother  became  too  infirm  to  at 
tend  to  the  house,  and  both  the  old  people  needed  much 
waiting  upon,  that  a  near  neighbor,  who  had  lost  his  wife 


"WHAT  LUCK    YOU  HAVE  MARRYING."        289 

the  previous  year,  began  to  come  frequently  to  the  house. 
Sometimes  an  inquiry  after  hoop-poles,  at  other  times 
after  sap-buckets,  and  once  or  twice  for  a  stone-boat 
brought  him  there.  It  turned  out  in  the  end  that  the 
hoop-holes,  sap-buckets,  and  stone-boat  all  meant  Phcebe 
Elderkin.  One  day  Phoebe  went  out  in  the  great  mow 
ing  lot,  a  noble  meadow  on  the  intervale,  to  tell  Josiah 
that  she  was  going  to  marry  Simon  Strong.  Josiah  was 
utterly  amazed.  Such  a  thought  had  never  entered  his 
mind. 

"  Sakes  alive,  Phoebe,"  he  exclaimed,  "  what  luck  you 
do  have  marrying  !  I  could  never  get  one  wife,  and  you 
are  going  to  take  a  second  husband.  And  there  is 
Deacon  Spender's  wife  living  with  her  fourth.  It  beats 
all,  it  beats  all  !  " 

This  was  all  he  ever  said — not  a  word  of  reproach  to 
Phcebe  for  leaving  him  at  a  critical  time  after  he  had 
tided  her  over  the  difficult  years  of  her  life.  But  at  that 
time  Josiah  began  to  play  rather  gloomy  psalm-tunes  on 
the  old  reed  organ,  and  he  was  a  little  depressed  and 
discomfited  until  he  had  secured  a  distant  cousin,  Miss 
Jane  Farrar,  to  keep  house  for  him.  Jane  when  she 
came  was  rather  a  spiteful,  snappish  old  spinster,  with  a 
mania  for  neatness  sufficient  to  drive  a  less  placid  man 
than  Josiah  out  of  his  mind.  There  seemed  to  be  no 
chair  he  could  sit  down  on  in  his  own  house,  no  object  he 
could  handle.  One  day  Jane  was  sweeping  the  room 
with  that  peculiar  snap  of  the  petticoats  which  marks  the 
overzeal  of  such  a  nature.  Josiah  kept  moving  his  chair 
so  as  to  get  directly  in  the  path  of  her  broom.  At  last, 
out  of  all  patience,  she  exclaimed,  "  Josiah  Belknap, 
what  do  you  mean  ?  " 

"  Why,  Jane,"  he  answered  mildly,  "  I  thought  I'd  see 
if  you  wouldn't  sweep  me  right  out-of-doors,  and  never 
know  I  was  any  thing  better  than  floor  litter.  I  expect 
you  think  it's  an  awful  trial  to  have  men  folks  tracking 


290  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

around  and  making  dirt,  and  if  you  should  sweep  me  out 
you  would  get  rid  of  me  in  an  easy  way." 

Jane  never  forgot  the  lesson.  She  could  not  quite 
change  her  nature,  but  she  came  to  reverence  Josiah  as 
every  one  did  who  knew  him.  She  took  the  best  of  care 
of  the  old  people,  who  both  became  bedridden  before 
they  died,  and  in  the  last  years,  when  Josiah  was  an  old 
man,  she  would  listen  at  the  door  to  hear  him  playing  on 
the  organ.  She  always  knew  by  the  tones  whether  he 
was  sad  or  cheerful,  and  sometimes  she  felt  that  he  had 
escaped  to  regions  where  she  could  not  follow. 


CHAPTER  XXXI. 

ZIP    COON,    A    DOG    STORY. 

THESE  days,  so  persistently  breathed  upon  by  the 
moist,  languid  South,  have  a  supplement,  or  hour  of 
cooling  on  the  river.  A  vague  mystic  light  reflects  from 
its  mirror  long  after  the  sun  has  set.  The  placid  waters 
dissolve  the  real  world  and  recreate  it  in  wonderful 
form.  Another  sweep  of  the  oar,  and  you  may  break 
into  strange  silent  seas,  a  million  miles  from  any  thing 
you  have  ever  known.  Late  haycocks  dot  the  low  banks 
and  send  forth  pungent  sweetness.  Dim  gleams  from 
the  sunset,  which  has  left  a  glowing  red  crater  like  a  coal 
in  a  heap  of  ashes,  plunge  far  down  to  where  the  water- 
nixies  live.  The  banks,  and  houses,  and  distant  hills, 
and  clumps  of  trees  have  melted  like  dissolved  diamonds 
into  the  sky,  or  have  taken  on  a  velvet  brown  as  soft  as 
the  plumage  of  a  raven.  The  shadows  plunge  down  into 
the  crystal,  like  ebony  columns,  and  the  spaces  in  be 
tween  seem  too  pure  for  water.  We  imagine  our  boat 
has  glided  upon  air,  or  even  floated  forth  to  interstellar 
ether. 

There  is  a  young  moon  to-night,  a  mere  silver  sickle, 
but  it  begins  to  make  its  waxing  tell.  Its  tricksy  beams 
glide  deftly  in  among  the  boughs  of  the  black  trees  as  if 
in  search  of  elves  and  fays.  All  plants  breathe  out  the 
best  they  have.  No  noxious  thing  grows  here  ;  henbane, 
nightshade,  poisonous  ivy,  the  nymphs  will  have  none  of 
you.  They  choose  cool  sedge,  and  whispering  reeds,  and 
fresh-smelling  grasses,  sweet  clover  from  the  water- 
meadows,  and  mint  from  where  the  brooks  come  down. 
Far  off  in  the  east  a  cloud  hovers  invisible,  except  when 


292  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

it  sends  out  broad  sheets  or  twisted  serpents  of  pale  red 
heat-lightning.  Then  you  see  the  cloud  is  composite,  an 
air  palace,  having  walls,  and  pinnacles,  and  towers,  and 
domes,  with  strange  gleams  as  of  Oriental  cities  flashing 
out  from  an  unknown  strand. 

This  goes  on  in  the  sky  while  the  shadows  creep  and 
broaden.  A  light  mist  begins  to  rise  from  the  river 
banks,  and  a  great  frog  has  had  the  temerity  to  sound  his 
bass  note  in  a  silence  the  breezes  respect  as  they  go 
whispering,  feat-footed,  amid  the  boughs  and  over  the 
meadow  grass. 

The  village  gardens  are  lovely  at  twilight  ;  dim  lights 
gleam  through  the  shrubberies  when  the  star  of  love 
rises,  and  ladies  in  white  gowns  go  flitting  about  among 
the  flowers,  young  girls  fly  across  the  street  bareheaded, 
children  romp  in  and  out.  There  is  a  little  reception  in 
nearly  every  garden,  where  people  have  come  to  glean 
the  odors  of  the  sweet  pea  and  the  verbena,  the  mignon 
ette,  and  carnation.  Old-fashioned  blossoms,  common 
flowers  as  they  are  called,  are  much  cultivated  in  the  vil 
lage.  They  grow  in  accord  with  their  own  fancy,  spring 
ing  up  beside  grassy  paths  in  bright  knots  and  clusters 
without  the  stiff  order  of  beds. 

The  doctor's  garden  is  a  perfect  specimen  of  what 
such  a  lawless  village  garden  should  be.  One  side  of  it 
is  shaded  by  tall  plum  and  cherry  trees,  and  there  are 
other  places  devoted  to  great  branchy  trees  bearing 
delicious  bough  apples.  In  the  center  is  a  little  rustic 
arbor,  covered  with  a  mass  of  blooming  clematis  and 
madeira  vine.  The  arbor  is  sheltered  by  the  boughs  of  a 
large  catalpa,  one  of  the  few  catalpa  trees  in  this  part  of 
the  country,  with  a  circular  bench  running  about  it. 
Growing  in  among  the  tall  corn  and  the  other  vegetables 
are  immense  sunflowers,  while  the  hardiest  common 
blooms  edge  every  path.  There  is  one  nook  by  the 
wicket  gate  made  by  a  great  mass  of  sunflower,  scarlet 


IN   THE   GARDEN.  293 

and  white  climbing  beans,  and  hollyhocks  of  all  shades. 
It  is  such  a  bower  as  Arachne  must  have  lived  in  when 
she  excited  the  fury  of  Minerva  by  her  exquisite  embroid 
ery  and  the  envious  goddess  turned  her  into  a  spider. 
The  doctor  has  great  pleasure  in  watching  the  humming 
birds  when  they  visit  this  huge  bouquet,  and  dive  their 
bills  into  the  cups  of  the  flowers. 

One  evening  the  doctor  and  his  wife  and  grandchild 
were  all  out  under  the  shade  of  the  catalpa  tree  just  at 
that  witching  time  when  the  brown  night-moth  goes 
droning  on  his  heavy  wing.  The  doctor's  wife  looked 
almost  young  in  her  light  gown,  with  soft  lace  at  the 
throat.  The  young  girl  was  frolicking  with  a  string  and 
a  white  kitten.  They  could  hear  Hugh  playing  tennis 
with  the  Spencer  girls  behind  the  hedge  next  door  and 
giving  forth  his  Homeric  laugh.  The  village  is  a  whis 
pering  gallery  on  a  warm  evening  when  the  windows  are 
all  open.  It  is  even  said  that  when  Mr.  Johns  proposed 
to  rich  old  Miss  Merkland,  who  is  deaf,  he  was  heard 
quite  a  way  down  the  street. 

As  the  doctor  and  his  family  sat  thus  in  peace, 
enjoying  the  coolness  of  the  summer  evening,  a  light 
tap,  tap  was  heard  on  the  gravel  walk,  and  a  yellow 
dog  appeared  before  them,  a  gaunt,  hungry,  mangy 
creature,  with  tail  tucked  between  his  legs  in  protest, 
as  if  he  expected  to  go  yelping  away  the  next 
moment  from  the  kick  of  a  sturdy  foot.  One  ragged 
ear  hung  down  dejectedly,  while  the  other  perked  itself 
up  in  the  air  with  a  ludicrous  attempt  at  smartness.  The 
dog  had  been  around  to  nearly  every  house  in  the  village, 
running  through  the  gate  and  in  at  the  door  if  it  hap 
pened  to  be  open.  Some  had  given  it  hard  words,  some 
had  kicked  it,  or  shoved  it  out  with  a  broom,  and  others 
had  thrown  stones  at  it.  A  company  of  bad  boys 
had  even  tied  a  tin  kettle  to  its  tail  and  sent  it  crying 
with  pain  and  fright  down  a  cow-lane  toward  the  river. 


294  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

Not  one  human  being  had  given  it  a  kind  word  or  a 
crumb  of  any  thing  to  eat.  The  poor  creature  rid  itself 
as  best  it  could  of  the  tin  kettle  and  crept  back  into  the 
village,  slinking  along  to  avoid  observation  and  blows  as 
much  as  possible.  It  was  unmistakably  hungry,  and  the 
pathos  of  its  eyes  said  so.  It  continued  its  doggish 
quest  until  it  came  into  the  doctor's  garden  and  to  where 
the  good  man  sat  in  the  arbor.  It  came  close  to  his  feet 
and  whined  and  wagged  its  ragged  tail,  and  looked  up 
appealingly  into  his  face,  with  an  assurance  of  comfort 
that  it  had  found  a  friend.  The  doctor  ordered  the  girl 
in  the  kitchen  to  feed  the  dog,  although  Mrs.  Rivington 
protested.  She  was  a  charitable  woman,  but  she  felt  that 
the  line  must  be  drawn  somewhere,  and  vagrant  dogs, 
especially  of  that  common  yellow  breed,  had  always  been 
her  aversion. 

The  doctor's  household  went  to  bed,  the  whole  village 
went  to  bed.  The  stars  looked  down  through  the  elms, 
and  stray  moonbeams  from  the  setting  orb  winked  here 
and  there  upon  the  projection  of  a  roof  or  threw  their 
light  along  the  dewy  grass.  Every  body  had  forgotten 
the  vagrant  dog.  In  the  morning,  however,  when  the 
doctor  awoke  and  went  out  to  the  stable  to  order  his 
horse  for  a  round  of  country  visits,  there  lay  that  yellow, 
mangy,  lop-eared,  ill-conditioned  cur  directly  in  his  path. 
The  poor  creature  showed  all  his  ribs,  as  the  doctor  could 
see  in  the  morning  light,  and  there  were  upon  him  the 
scars  and  sores  of  many  a  battle  with  stronger  and 
better-fed  dogs.  The  doctor's  professional  eye  saw  that 
he  had  a  gaping  wound  on  one  of  his  hind  legs,  where  the 
flesh  had  been  laid  open  to  the  bone,  and  was  raw  and 
bleeding.  The  human  heart  in  him  could  not  leave  the 
leg  of  a  stray  dog  in  that  condition.  He  hurried  again 
into  his  office  and  brought  out  a  flask  of  ointment.  He 
cleaned  the  wound  and  applied  the  ointment,  and  the 
dog's  eyes  looked  as  if  they  were  filled  with  grateful  tears, 


THE    VAGRANT  DOG.  295 

while  he  fairly  whimpered  with  gratitude.  He  had  slunk 
away,  expecting  a  kick  from  the  doctor's  heavy  boot,  but 
the  doctor  never  kicked  any  thing  weaker  than  him 
self.  It  was  only  meanness  and  selfishness  and  utter  in 
gratitude  the  old  man  felt  the  impulse  to  chastise.  Now, 
as  he  again  looked  at  the  dog,  a  gleam  of  recognition 
came  into  his  mind.  Surely  he  had  seen  those  eyes,  that 
one  lop-  and  one  prick-ear,  but  his  memory  failed  him  ; 
he  could  not  place  the  dog.  But  he  had  him  fed  again 
.at  the  kitchen  door,  and  then  he  drove  him  out  of  the 
yard  and  told  him  to  go  home.  But  he  was  no  sooner 
seated  in  his  wagon  and  trotting  along  the  road  than  he 
was  conscious  of  the  fact  that  that  common  "  yaller  "  dog 
was  trotting  along  by  his  side,  accurately  adapting  his 
steps  to  the  pace  of  the  old  mare. 

The  doctor  spoke  crossly  to  him  and  again  told  him  to 
go  home.  But  the  ill-conditioned  creature  only  looked 
around  under  his  lop-ear,  as  much  as  to  say  :  "  I'm  going 
home  and  you  are  going  with  me."  Finally  the  dog 
edged  along  and  took  the  lead,  first  on  one  side  of  the  road 
and  then  on  the  other,  keeping  a  certain  distance  from 
the  mare's  heels,  and  occasionally  looking  round  at  the 
doctor  to  see  if  he  was  observing  his  motions.  The 
doctor,  who  was  a  close  observer  of  the  habits  of  animals, 
could  hardly  help  becoming  interested  in  this  creature's 
maneuvers.  He  had  expected  him  to  dart  away  at  every 
lane  and  turning,  but  the  persistent  dog-trot  he  kept  up 
in  front  of  the  wagon  finally  produced  the  impression 
that  the  dog  must  have  some  set  purpose  in  his  mind. 

When  they  came  to  a  fork  of  the  road  branching  off  to 
Windham  one  way,  the  doctor  took  the  left  hand  turning 
to  go  on  a  visit  to  Felix  Brown,  who  had  been  dying  of 
lung  consumption  for  fifteen  years,  and  would  yet  per 
haps  outlive  some  healthy  folk.  But  the  dog  wished  him 
to  take  the  Windham  road  for  reasons  known  only  to 
himself.  He  squatted  down  in  the  dust,  lying  flat  on  his 


296  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

stomach,  and  whined,  and  howled,  and  scratched  with 
every  sign  of  distress.  The  doctor,  who  was  slightly  su 
perstitious  perhaps,  as  we  all  are,  watched  the  dog's  be 
havior  with  surprise  and  interest,  and  after  debating  a 
time  with  himself,  half  ashamed  at  his  own  weakness,  he 
decided  to  let  the  creature  have  his  way,  and  turned  his 
mare's  head  down  the  Windham  road.  Fortunately  there 
were  no  very  pressing  cases  on  his  calendar  that  morning. 

When  the  dog  saw  that  the  doctor  had  yielded  to  him,  he 
went  quite  wild  with  delight,  barking,  and  yapping,  and 
nearly  leaping  into  the  wagon  in  the  delirium  of  his  joy. 
The  doctor  was  a  firm  believer  in  the  instincts  of  the 
lower  orders  of  creation.  He  had  a  theory  of  his  own  as 
to  the  dim  border-land  between  the  limits  of  instinct  and 
the  domain  of  human  intelligence,  and  it  was  this  which 
led  him  to  try  and  discover  what  the  dog  meant  by  his 
strange  actions. 

A  long  way  the  dog  led  the  bewildered  doctor,  keeping 
on  and  on  with  a  persistent  trot  in  spite  of  his  lame  leg. 
He  did  not  wish  to  go  to  Windham,  that  was  clear,  but 
struck  off  on  a  stony  by-road  leading  quite  away  from  the 
hills  and  the  river  valley,  until  they  came  to  a  miserably 
poor  country,  and  into  the  edge  of  an  extensive  piece  of 
pine  timber.  This  the  doctor  at  once  knew  was  the  pine 
barrens,  a  region  he  had  not  visited  for  several  years. 
All  cultivation  soon  ceased,  and  every  sign  of  life  disap 
peared  except  such  as  clustered  here  and  there  about  the 
slab  shanty  of  a  turpentine-maker.  In  a  cluster  of  these 
— three  or  four  standing  together — the  doctor  caught 
sight  of  the  vagabond  Jabez  sitting  sunning  himself  in 
the  door  of  one  of  the  slab  shanties,  with  his  knees  drawn 
up  until  they  nearly  touched  his  chin.  The  unkempt  hair 
was  hanging  in  tangled  wisps  on  his  shoulders,  and  he 
looked  sickly  and  haggard.  His  feet  were  bare,  and  his 
lean  person  was  scarcely  covered  by  rags.  He  nodded 
to  the  doctor  as  if  not  in  the  least  surprised  to  see  him 


GKA  VES  MADE  IN   THE   SAND.  297 

there,  and  now  the  doctor  at  once  knew  where  he  had 
seen  the  dog,  for  the  animal  had  attached  itself  to  the 
wandering  fortunes  of  the  child  called  "  Chippie  "  even 
while  Jabez  and  his  miserable  family  lived  in  the  doorless 
house  in  the  woods.  It  was  several  months  since  Jabez 
had  been  moved  by  Farmer  White  down  to  the  barrens. 
The  doctor  looked  at  Jabez,  who  did  not  rise  or  change 
his  position.  He  le'aned  forward  in  the  wagon  and 
grasped  his  whip  firmly.  "  What's  wrong  here  ?  "  he  said 
sternly.  "  Purty  considerable,"  drawled  Jabez,  lifting  his 
lack-luster,  leaden  eyes.  "  She  (referring  to  his  wife)  and 
that  there  boy  baby  she  called  John  Rivington  both  died 
of  dipthery  nigh  goin'  on  two  week  ago.  And  the  folks 
here  at  work  in  the  turpentine  made  their  graves  down 
yender  in  the  sand.  They  was  took  and  died  suddent 
like  before  we  could  call  a  doctor  ;  and  I  was  took  the 
next  week.  And  I  hain't  got  around  any  to  speak  of  yet. 
And  the  gal  she's  laying  sick  there  inside." 

He  jerked  his  thumb  back  over  his  shoulder,  but  had 
not  the  energy  to  turn  his  head.  The  doctor  sprang  out 
of  the  wagon  with  something  that  sounded  like  an  impre 
cation,  and  stumbled  over  Jabez  into  the  hut.  The  dog 
was  already  there  beside  Chippie.  Her  poor  little  wasted 
hand  lay  on  the  ragged  coverlet,  and  the  creature  was 
licking  it  all  over  and  extending  his  caresses  to  the  sick 
child's  face.  She  lay  on  a  truckle-bed  with  an  old  straw 
tick  under  her,  and  had  no  covering  but  the  ragged  quilt. 
A  woman's  cotton  skirt,  one  of  the  dead  mother's, 
was  bundled  up  to  serve  as  a  pillow.  One  of  the 
pitch-boilers  in  the  barrens,  a  kind  hearted,  rough  young 
fellow,  whose  every  other  word  was  an  oath,  had  brought 
the  sick  child  part  of  his  breakfast.  It  stood  untouched 
on  a  broken  chair — salt  pork,  leathery  flap-jacks,  and 
thick  muddy  coffee.  The  child  was  very  feverish.  Her 
lips  were  baked  and  dry,  and  the  great  eyes  seemed  to 
have  burned  their  way  into  the  sallow,  pinched  face, 


29  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

making  circles  of  darkness.  The  cabin  was  such  a  pic 
ture  of  poverty,  wretchedness,  and  filth  as  the  doctor  had 
never  beheld.  He  felt  a  great  rising  in  his  throat,  and 
could  not  speak  to  the  child  for  some  moments,  though 
she  was  perfectly  conscious,  and  had  her  wistful  eyes 
fixed  on  his  face. 

Her  mother  and  the  baby  were  gone,  that  baby  she  had 
tended  nights,  and  toiled  for  days,  and  loved  so  dearly  ; 
that  poor,  nerveless,  sick,  discouraged  mother  she  had 
taken  care  of  as  if  nature  had  changed  their  relations 
and  made  her  the  parent.  But  deliverance  had  come  to 
her.  The  good  man  who  looked  to  her  so  like  a  savior 
laid  his  fatherly,  kind  hand  on  her  hot  forehead  and 
touched  her  so  gently  poor  little  Chippie  thought  there 
was  healing  in  his  touch.  He  gave  her  a  dose  of  some 
thing  from  his  medicine  case,  which  he  mixed  with  a  little 
water  in  a  tea-cup,  and  she  dropped  asleep  and  slept  and 
slept  whole  days  and  weeks  and  months,  it  seemed. 

When  she  partly  awoke,  Chippie  fancied  she  was  slowly 
moving  out  in  the  fresh  air  she  loved.  She  heard  the 
birds  singing  and  her  dog  Zip  Coon  barking  and  yapping 
joyfully  ;  but  she  could  not  tell  where  she  was,  so  she 
fell  asleep  again,  and  when  she  awoke  she  found  herself 
in  a  clean  chamber  with  windows  opening  to  the  east,  in 
a  white  bed,  dressed  in  a  little  fresh-ironed  gown,  and 
lying  so  sweetly  at  rest,  with  a  sense  of  new  life  and 
strength  coming  slowly  into  her  limbs,  she  thought  at  first 
she  was  dead.  She  looked  at  her  wasted  hands  and  lean 
arms  and  wondered  if  she  had  gone  to  the  same  place 
where  her  mother  and  the  baby  were.  She  tried  to  stick 
her  foot  out  from  under  the  sheet,  to  see  if  it  were  really 
hers,  and  finally  she  gave  it  up,  as  costing  too  much  effort. 
She  might  be  somebody  else,  but  she  was  very  happy. 

She  was  lying  in  a  chamber  in  the  doctor's  house.  He 
had  brought  her  home  under  the  influence  of  an  anodyne, 
and  had  her  warm-bathed,  and  dres-sed  clean  in  one  of 


WHA  T   TO  DO    WITH  JABEZ.  299 

his  granddaughter's  gowns  which  she  had  outgrown,  and 
put  to  bed.  The  neighbors  all  remembered  Chippie 
kindly,  and  they  came  to  see  her  and  coddle  her  in  her 
convalescence  with  fruits  and  flowers,  and  jellies  and 
custards,  and  dozens  of  dainties  the  poor  child  had  never 
tasted  before  in  her  life.  Every  body  talked  over  the 
remarkable  sagacity  and  affection  manifested  by  the  dog. 
Some  even  went  the  length  of  saying  they  believed  dogs 
have  souls.  They  were  the  very  people  who  had  flung 
stones  and  broken  crockery  and  brickbats  after  Zip  Coon 
when  he  made  his  tour  of  the  village  as  an  itinerant  cur. 
The  doctor  has  never  explained  the  dog's  behavior  quite 
satisfactorily  to  himself ;  he  is  inclined  to  think  that 
some  dogs  may  have  long  memories,  and  may  even  go 
through  a  mental  process  which  is  akin  to  the  association 
of  ideas.  The  young  girls  of  the  village,  headed  by  the 
doctor's  granddaughter,  formed  themselves  into  a  soci 
ety  to  provide  Chippie  a  wardrobe  ;  and  with  the  zeal  of 
young  girls  every  thing  must  be  tucked,  and  frilled,  and 
prettily  trimmed. 

The  neighbors  were  fully  impressed  by  the  tragic  end 
of  Mrs.  Jabez  and  the  infant  John  Rivington,  but  they 
could  not  help  laughing  at  the  fate  which  had  brought 
Jabez  back  upon  the  doctor's  hands.  What  to  do  with 
Jabez  had  again  become  a  burning  question.  He  had 
agreed  to  give  up  control  of  Chippie  if  some  provision 
were  made  for  him.  When  asked  what  he  thought 
he  could  do,  Jabez  scratched  his  head  and  after 
meditating  said  he  would  like  some  place  under  govern 
ment.  He  guessed  there  were  some  as  "  poor  cusses" 
as  he  was  who  got  pretty  good  fat  offices  if  they  only  had 
"  inflooence."  The  doctor  keenly  appreciated  this  satire 
on  office-holders,  but  as  it  was  not  feasible  to  try  and 
gratify  the  ambition  of  Jabez  for  political  preferment,  he 
thought  of  trying  to  get  him  a  place  as  flagman  on  the 
railroad.  This  raised  such  an  outcry  in  the  town  among 


3°°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

people  who  declared  they  would  never  trust  their  necks 
on  the  road  if  he  were  flagman,  because  they  were  sure  he 
would  always  be  asleep  in  his  little  house  when  the  trains 
came  along,  that  the  idea  had  to  be  abandoned. 

At  last  Jabez  reverted  to  his  one  idea  of"  pop."  He 
felt  sure  he  could  make  a  "  pop,"  if  he  had  the  small  capi 
tal  to  start  on,  that  would  seduce  the  very  elect.  The 
doctor  furnished  the  capital,  and  having  dressed  Jabez 
in  a  suit  of  his  old  clothes  several  sizes  too  large  for  him, 
sent  him  to  Windham  to  set  up  the  "  pop  "  business,  where 
he  bottles  a  kind  of  stuff  which  he  calls  ginger-ale,  and 
sells  to  the  turpentine  and  pitch-workers.  The  doctor 
would  have  taken  Zip  Coon,  the  faithful  yellow  cur, 
for  his  own  watchdog,  but  Zip  never  would  live  apart 
from  Chippie.  If  he  were  tied  up  in  a  strange  place  for 
days,  as  soon  as  he  found  himself  free  he  would  make  his 
way  back  to  the  child,  lying  by  the  path  where  she  had 
walked,  or  scratching  at  the  door  she  had  entered.  Chip 
pie  has  been  partially  adopted  by  an  eccentric  old  lady 
who  quarreled  with  all  her  relations,  and  lived  alone,  but 
still  needed  a  young  girl  to  run  errands  and  do  light  work 
about  the  house.  The  old  lady  has  been  obliged  to 
adopt  Zip  Coon  also,  and  now  he  is  fatter  in  the  ribs  than 
he  was.  You  would  never  know  Chippie  in  her  new 
clothes — dear,  patient,  unwearied  little  Chippie,  so  willing 
to  run  her  feet  off  to  please  her  mistress,  so  eager  to  learn 
in  the  village  school.  Who  can  help  loving  Chippie, 
whose  life's  dawn  was  so  sad  and  clouded  when  she  lived 
like  a  bird  in  the  hedge  ?  Dear  to  God  is  such  a  wild 
blossom,  and  He  will  guard  her.  The  doctor  has  had 
the  mother  and  baby  brought  from  their  sandy  graves 
in  the  pine  barrens  and  buried  on  the  hill,  where  Chippie 
can  go  sometimes  to  sit  beside  them.  And  then  her 
face  seems  older  and  more  thoughtful  than  it  should 
seem  for  one  so  young. 


CHAPTER  XXXII. 

A    DOMESTIC    TYRANT. 

^PHERE  is  a  drive  called  the  Roundabout  Road,  which 
1  makes  a  circuit  of  exactly  seven  miles,  and  takes  in 
some  of  the  pleasantest  bits  of  scenery  in  this  region. 
The  hills  are  nowhere  very  steep,  and  there  are  many  old 
horses  in  the  village  that  know  the  Roundabout  Road  as 
well  as  their  own  stalls.  It  crosses  several  brawling  trout 
streams  and  rustic  bridges,  and  passes  the  prettiest 
watering-troughs,  where  the  gushing  mountain  springs, 
bright  and  mobile  as  quicksilver,  run  through  channels 
made  in  mossy  logs.  Near  one  of  these  grows  a  bed  of 
the  wild  forget-me-not  with  its  eyes  of  heavenly  blue. 
The  arethusa  is  now  to  be  found  on  the  river  meadows. 
It  is  of  a  purple  such  as  is  only  seen  in  evening  and 
morning  clouds.  Before  many  weeks  have  passed  the 
fringed  gentian  will  open  along  the  drive,  in  such  places 
as  it  has  chosen  for  its  habitat. 

At  Dexter's  chair  factory  the  Roundabout  enters  a 
little  glen  fringed  to  the  very  top  of  its  walls  with  the 
light  foliage  of  young  birches,  beeches,  chestnuts,  and 
ash  trees.  Late  in  the  season  this  place  wears  the  aspect 
of  early  spring  ;  and  in  the  cool  crevices  of  its  rocks  ice 
is  found  until  July.  The  hermit  thrush  builds  and  sings 
here,  and  may  be  heard  at  some  moment  of  rare  good 
fortune.  Autumn  comes  first  to  this  spot  and  runs  like 
fire  in  the  low  undergrowth.  The  sumac  bushes  turn  the 
most  brilliant  dyes.  The  young  maple-shoots  are  red 
like  blood.  The  ash  shrubs  seem  to  drip  with  gold. 

Many  people  drive  over  the  Roundabout  Road  every 
fair  day.  It  is  a  road  that  never  wearies,  for  the  hills 


3° 2  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

are  continually  changing  under  the  varying  influences  of 
light  and  shade,  heat  and  cold,  wind  and  fair  weather. 
Several  retired  clergymen  and  college  professors  live  in  the 
village,  having  come  here  to  pass  their  last  years.  Nearly 
all  of  them  keep  slow,  ambling,  sure-footed  nags,  who 
possess  all  the  equine  virtues  except  speed  and  the  power 
to  raise  their  noses  more  than  three  or  four  inches  above 
the  dust.  They  amble  along,  never  varying  their  gait 
except  to  stop  stock  still.  In  the  retired  clerical  set  it  is 
considered  a  sin  to  use  a  check-rein  or  a  whip.  They 
are  mostly  mild,  quiet,  old  ladies  and  gentlemen  who 
belong  to  the  past,  but  have  lingered  along  into  the 
present  with  the  understanding  that  they  are  practically 
laid  upon  the  shelf.  Though  they  have  once  doubtless 
been  important  and  celebrated,  it  is  conceded  that  their 
day  is  over,  and  they  are  just  biding  their  time  and  try 
ing  to  make  themselves  as  comfortable  as  circumstances 
and  small  incomes  may  permit. 

Chief  among  the  superannuated  clericals  is  the  Rev. 
Elkanah  Stackpole.  He  occasionally  preaches  in  the 
village  church,  when  most  of  the  congregation  scatters, 
some  to  visit  their  friends  in  the  country,  others  to  go 
blueberrying  or  nutting  on  the  sly.  The  few  who  do 
attend  church  from  conscientious  motives  generally  fall 
asleep  in  the  pews.  It  is  thought  that  if  Mr.  Stackpole 
were  to  preach  three  consecutive  Sundays,  every  soul 
would  desert  the  church  except  old  Amen  Anderson, 
who  is  as  deaf  as  a  post  and  who  says  he  always  goes  to 
meeting,  whoever  preaches,  for  "  innerd  edification." 
You  will  know  Amen  by  his  standing  up  in  his  corner 
and  singing  the  hymns  on  a  plan  of  his  own.  He  pays 
no  heed  to  any  body  or  any  thing  except  long  and  short 
meter. 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Stackpole  halts  in  his  walk  from  chronic 
rheumatism,  and  Mrs.  Stackpole  is  a  nervous  invalid. 
They  live  in  an  old-fashioned  gambrel-roofed  house,where 


SPICER 'S  MOODS.  3°3 

perpetual  quietude  and  twilight  formerly  reigned,  a  green 
twilight  thrown  from  the  thick  trees  growing  close  to  the 
windows,  and  from  the  prevailing  tone  of  the  furnishing. 
Every  body  in  the  village  knew  the  Stackpole's  maid, 
Araminta  Sophronia,  called  Minty  for  short,  and  the 
Stackpole's  horse,  Spicer.  Spicer  used  to  trot  over 
Roundabout  Road  every  fine  day  in  summer.  He  came 
to  the  door  about  nine  in  the  morning  from  the  stable 
where  he  was  kept.  Minty  bustled  out  with  two  air- 
cushions  for  the  excellent  couple  to  sit  on.  She  was  also 
provided  with  an  armful  of  wraps  and  umbrellas  and  a 
hassock  for  Mrs.  Stackpole's  feet.  The  operation  of 
loading  the  Stackpoles  into  the  chaise  was  a  difficult  one, 
but  Minty  was  always  equal  to  it.  When  she  had  once 
tucked  them  in  under  the  lap-blanket,  and  the  Rev. 
Elkanah  had  feebly  grasped  the  reins,  she  then  turned 
her  attention  to  Spicer. 

If  Spicer  was  in  the  mood,  he  would  start  off  promptly, 
and  keep  up  a  slow  trot  for  a  certain  length  of  time.  If 
Spicer  was  not  in  the  mood,  he  would  lay  back  his  ears, 
and  shake  his  head  positively.  Then  began  a  coaxing 
process  on  the  part  of  Minty.  She  patted  him,  whispered 
in  his  ear,  and  generally  administered  one  or  two  lumps 
of  white  sugar,  when  Spicer,  being  placated,  would  dart 
off  so  suddenly  as  to  throw  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Stackpole 
against  the  back  of  the  chaise.  But  Minty  knew  that  if 
she  once  succeeded  in  starting  Spicer,  he  might  be  trusted 
to  bring  the  old  couple  home  in  perfect  safety.  There 
were  places  on  the  road  where  he  persisted  in  walking, 
and  he  had  even  been  known  to  stop  in  shady  spots,  spite 
of  all  the  Rev.  Elkanah  could  do,  to  crop  a  little  tender 
herbage.  When  he  had  swung  partly  round  the  circle,  he 
began  to  smell  the  stable,  and  generally  came  home  in  fine 
style. 

Minty  ruled  for  many  years  in  the  Stackpole  house. 
She  was  an  admirable  housekeeper,  but  having  usurped 


3°4  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS, 

supreme  power,  the  vice  of  power,  a  tyrannical  and 
overbearing  spirit,  grew  upon  her.  Few  great  minds 
can  resist  the  temptation  of  power,  and  Minty  was  not  a 
great  mind.  The  old  people  came  to  feel  that  Minty  was 
indispensable  to  their  comfort  and  well-being,  and  the 
ability  to  govern  themselves  gradually  slipped  through 
their  fingers.  No  one  in  that  house  attempted  to  oppose 
Minty  except  Fielding  Stackpole,  the  only  son,  who  was 
a  civil  engineer,  living  in  another  state.  When  Fielding 
came  home  on  a  visit,  as  he  did  several  times  a  year,  he 
brushed  aside  all  Minty's  rules  and  regulations.  He 
smoked  where  he  pleased,  carried  the  parlor  chairs  out 
on  the  lawn  and  left  them  there,  tumbled  the  book-cases, 
came  down  late  to  breakfast  and  ordered  fresh  coffee  and 
hot  buttered  toast,  exactly  as  if  he  were  the  master  in  his 
father's  house  and  not  at  all  subject  to  the  rule  of  Queen 
Araminta  Sophronia. 

The  conflict  of  wills  between  Fielding  and  the  maid 
put  a  very  sharp  edge  on  Minty's  temper,  while  Fielding 
always  came  up  more  and  more  bland  and  smiling,  with 
the  conviction  that  he  should  win  in  the  end.  Minty 
had  carried  it  so  far  as  once  or  twice  to  refuse  Fielding 
admission  to  his  father's  house  when  he  arrived  unexpect 
edly  late  at  night,  on  the  ground  that  she  was  house-clean 
ing  and  the  rooms  were  all  in  disorder.  But  Fielding 
calmly  climbed  in  at  a  pantry  window  and  established 
himself  without  ceremony  in  his  own  room.  After  Field 
ing's  visits  the  old  people  were  always  more  insubordi 
nate,  and  it  gave  her  a  little  trouble  to  break  them  in 
again  to  rules  and  regulations. 

Minty,  in  spite  of  her  name,  did  not  come  from  Burnt 
Pigeon,  but  from  a  place  down  the  river,  called  Salt 
Lick.  She  was  always  talking  about  the  Lick  in  a  most 
misleading  way,  as  if  it  were  something  to  eat.  The 
Lick  hung  like  the  sword  of  Damocles  over  the  head  of 
poor  Mrs.  Stackpole,  especially  after  the  old  people  came 


ARAM2NTA    SOPHRONIA.  3°5 

to  feel  that  in  their  helpless  state  they  could  live  neither 
with  nor  without  their  domestic  tyrant,  for  Minty  often 
threatened  to  leave  her  at  a  moment's  notice,  and  return 
to  the  home  of  her  infancy. 

It  was  understood  that  Minty  had  married  a  Salt  Lick 
man  in  her  girlhood  who  had  not  proved  a  brilliant  or 
nament  to  society.  She  soon  rid  herself  of  the  encum 
brance.  She  never  mentioned  this  part  of  her  experi 
ence,  but  the  asperity  with  which  she  spoke  of  mankind 
in  general,  and  of  Fielding  Stackpole  in  particular,  was 
supposed  to  have  sprung  from  a  thorough  acquaintance 
with  the  sex.  She  was  of  a  thin,  wiry  type,  not  very  large, 
but  with  muscles  of  steel.  Her  face  came  to  a  sharp, 
hatchet  edge,  and  her  gray  eyes,  mottled  with  yellow, 
saw  every  thing.  She  was  confessedly  the  smartest  serv 
ant  in  the  village,  and  she  had  a  standing  of  her  own. 

Her  neatness,  of  the  inflexible,  cast-iron  kind,  was  a 
terror  to  the  neighborhood.  Even  particular  house 
keepers  trembled  under  her  dreadful  cat's  eyes.  Her 
house-cleaning  was  thought  to  be  as  bad  as  the  concen 
trated  three  movings  which  equal  a  fire.  But  the  excel 
lences  of  Minty  were  as  pronounced  as  her  foibles.  A 
tea  invitation  to  the  Stackpoles  was  something  to  date 
from.  The  ladies  seldom  took  much  dinner  on  those 
days,  in  order  to  save  their  appetites  for  Minty's  dainties. 
If  the  invaluable  servant  did  not  sit  down  in  the  parlor 
with  the  guests,  or  preside  at  the  tea-table,  she  still  car 
ried  off  the  honors  of  the  occasion.  Every  body  praised 
her  cookery  to  the  skies,  and  it  was  a  great  point  to  ask 
for  Minty's  receipts,  which  she  gave  or  not,  just  as  the 
whim  seized  her. 

Her  tea-table  was  a  work  of  art,  and  she  adorned  it 
with  a  tasteful  arrangement  of  flowers  from  the  garden. 
The  old-fashioned  Stackpole  china,  glass,  and  silver,  were 
burnished  to  exquisite  brightness.  The  napery  was 
ironed  only  as  Minty  knew  how  to  iron.  Her  tea- 


3°6  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

biscuits  melted  in  the  mouth.  Her  cake  was  always 
something  new  and  original.  She  knew  all  about  potted 
tongue,  veal  loaf,  boned  turkey,  and  brandied  peaches. 
Such  coffee,  whipped  cream  and  sherbet  as  she  made 
was  never  found  elsewhere.  So  it  was  in  every  depart 
ment  of  housekeeping.  A  favorite  subject  of  debate 
among  the  village  ladies  was  whether  it  would  be  pos 
sible  to  endure  Minty's  tyranny  for  the  sake  of  her 
culinary  virtues.  The  shameful  subjection  of  the  old 
clergyman  and  his  wife  to  this  strong-willed  domestic 
was  a  standing  topic  of  discussion  among  the  village 
gossips.  Every  fresh  usurpation  on  the  part  of  Minty 
was  commented  on  with  exclamation  points.  She  knew 
she  was  talked  about,  and  it  made  her  proud.  She  fully 
expected  to  be  buried  in  the  Stackpole  family  lot,  and  to 
have  a  coffin-plate  equal  to  her  master  and  mistress.  It 
was  reported  that  poor  Mrs.  Stackpole  said  one  day  to 
Minty  :  "  I  have  asked  my  sister  Jane  and  her  daughter 
to  come  and  pass  the  day  with  me  on  Thursday  next." 

To  which  Minty  immediately  replied  :  "  I  can't  think 
of  having  them  on  Thursday,  ma'am.  There's  the  sweet 
pickles  to  make,  and  I  must  clean  out  the  cellar.  I  never 
can  have  company  days  when  I  am  cleaning  out  the  cel 
lar.  It's  unreasonable  to  think  of  it."  Minty  always 
planned  to  clean  out  the  cellar  when  the  idea  of  com 
pany  was  obnoxious  to  her.  Mrs.  Stackpole  was  there 
fore  obliged  to  telegraph  to  "  Sister  Jane  "  that  she  must 
not  come.  And  she  found  herself  more  and  more  the 
bond-slave  of  her  incomparable  domestic. 

The  ex-professor  had  made  a  brave  effort  to  secure 
some  portion  of  his  own  house  for  his  exclusive  use  and 
benefit,  which  should  not  be  too  ruthlessly  invaded  by 
the  broom  and  duster.  He  wished  to  set  apart  a  small 
closet  where  he  might  think  his  own  thoughts,  and  doubt 
less  pray,  where  he  might  occasionally  indite  a  sermon  or 
a  report  of  the  missionary  society  for  carrying  the  Gospel 


MINTY'S  PIOUS  FERVOR.  3°7 

to  the  Zulus,  of  which  he  was  secretary.  But  all  in  vain. 
Araminta  Sophronia  did  not  believe  the  best  of  men 
could  think  holy  thoughts  in  any  place  from  which  her 
cleaning  hand  was  excluded.  If  she  could  have  taken 
out  the  conscience  of  poor  old  Stackpole  from  his  bosom, 
she  would  doubtless  have  washed  and  scoured  it.  For 
years  he  was  forced  to  see  his  desk,  his  pens,  his  papers 
arranged  in  an  order  foreign  to  his  soul.  But  no  one  had 
ever  done  up  his  fine  shirts  and  white  neck-cloths  like 
Minty  ;  and  when  he  was  ill  her  broths  and  gruels  were 
delicious.  Minty  always  attended  family  prayers  and 
sometimes  read  devotional  books,  not  because  she  had  a 
taste  for  them,  but  for  the  reason  that  she  lived  in  a 
minister's  family,  and  was  bound  to  keep  up  the  character 
of  the  household.  It  looked  well  to  have  a  volume  of 
dry  sermons  on  the  kitchen  shelf  and  illuminated  Bible 
texts  hung  about  on  the  wall. 

When  Minty  first  went  to  live  with  the  Stackpoles,  she 
made  up  her  mind  that  she  would  not  allow  them  to  har 
bor  poor  ministers,  religious  book-peddlers,  or  itinerant 
missionaries.  They  were  accordingly  sent  on  to  Deacon 
Hildreth's,  to  the  old  Tavern  House,  or  to  the  doctor's. 
And  the  old  couple,  as  they  could  not  help  themselves,  were 
rather  grateful  for  the  protection  they  enjoyed.  Occasion 
ally  guests  from  a  distance  came  to  stay  at  the  house  unan 
nounced  and  before  Minty's  fiat  could  reach  them.  As 
there  was  no  hotel  in  the  village  at  that  time,  Minty  could 
not  turn  them  out  of  doors.  But  she  always  discriminated 
against  city  visitors.  She  forced  them  to  unpack  their 
trunks  in  the  barn.  She  thought  country  folk  much  the 
cleaner.  Minty  knew  how  to  make  herself  very  dis 
agreeable  to  guests  without  letting  the  old  people  know 
any  thing  about  it.  She  had  been  sometimes  approached 
with  "  tips  "  in  the  hope  of  placating  her  dragonship,  but 
she  repelled  all  attempts  at  bribery  and  corruption  with 
seorn.  No  one  except  Fielding  Stackpole  ever  staid 


3°8  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

more  than  five  days  in  the  old  minister's  house.  The 
neighbors  kept  close  watch  to  see  if  the  rule  were 
infringed. 

There  cornes  a  day  of  reckoning  for  all  tyrants.     The 
standing  quarrel  between  Minty  and  Fielding  had  never 
been  healed.     The  best  they  could  do  was  to  proclaim  a 
truce.     Though  the  warfare  often  broke  out  afresh,  still 
they  could  manage  to  exist  together  under  the  same  roof 
a  few  weeks  each  year.     It  was  a  terrible  blow  to  Minty, 
therefore,  when  the  marriage  of  Fielding  Stackpole  was 
announced,  and  of  all  things  to  one  of  those  "  hity-tity, 
good-for-nothing  city  jades."     Another  great  blow  was 
the  fact  that  Fielding  and  his  bride  were  coming  home 
to   pass  the  summer.     Old  Mrs.  Stackpole  did  not  even 
ask  Minty's  permission  to  have  them  come.  Re-enforced 
by   a  strong   letter   from    Fielding,  she   simply  said    it 
would  be  a  great  pity  if  her  children  could  not  come  to 
their  father's  house  whenever  it  suited  their  convenience. 
This  sounded  like  the  tocsin  of  open  rebellion,  and  Min 
ty's  soul  was  troubled  within  her.     She  saw  that  the  old 
lady  had  already  taken  the  bride  into  her  heart.    But  that 
night  Mrs.  Stackpole  had  a  nervous  attack,  and  Minty 
rubbed  her  and  worked  over  her  for  several  hours.     She 
was  always  good  in  illness  ;  and   the  old  woman  tacitly 
asked  her  pardon.     Things  were   in  this  unsatisfactory 
state  when  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Fielding  Stackpole  arrived.  As 
a  first  act  of  resistance,  Fielding  refused  to  have  his  wife's 
trousseau  inspected  and  fumigated   in   the  barn   by  the 
domestic  customs  officer.    Minty,  though  she  had  to  yield 
this  point,  felt  strong  in  her  intrenched  position,  for  she 
was  certain  the  Stackpoles  could  not  live  without  her. 
Fielding  felt  strong  in  his  position  of  son,  especially  when 
supported  by  a  young,  bright-eyed  woman  who   looked 
upon  him  as  a  great  moral  hero,  although  he   had   never 
done  any  thing  to  merit  hero-worship.     He,  however,  felt 
it  would  be  a  noteworthy  thing  to  deliver  his  aged  parents 


THE  RETURN   TO  SALT  LICK.  309 

from  domestic  servitude.  The  bride  was  now  the  great 
center  of  attraction.  The  old  people  petted  her  and  re 
ceived  her  pettings  in  a  way  Minty  thought  perfectly  silly. 
Every  body  admired  her  pretty  costumes,  her  piano-play 
ing,  and  the  fact  that  she  spoke  French  like  a  native. 
The  neighbors  were  running  in  at  all  hours.  Meals  were 
irregular.  The  lights  were  no  longer  put  out  in  the  house 
exactly  at  half-past  nine.  The  window  screens  were  left 
out,  and  flies  buzzed  through  the  rooms. 

Minty  endured  it  as  long  as  she  could,  until,  like  Spicer, 
she  felt  that  her  time  had  come  to  balk.  Mrs.  Fielding 
Stackpole's  star  was  in  the  ascendant  ;  hers  was  on  the 
wane.  Her  main  hope  lay  in  the  old  lady's  nervous  at 
tacks,  which  no  one  could  allay  but  herself.  The  time 
had  come  to  try  her  strength  with  Fielding.  It  was  at  a 
moment  when  the  minister  was  absent  from  home,  and 
Mrs.  Stackpole  was  in  her  own  room  with  her  daughter- 
in-law.  There  was  a  terrible  scene,  but  in  the  end  Minty 
packed  her  trunk,  took  an  angry  leave  of  the  household, 
and  departed  for  Salt  Lick — departed  expecting  perfect 
submission  on  the  part  of  the  old  people  as  soon  as  the 
loss  was  felt,  and  to  return  in  triumph  at  the  end  of  a  few 
days,  to  the  total  routing  of  Fielding  and  his  wife. 

She  found  herself  ill  at  ease  at  Salt  Lick.  She  was  a 
person  of  not  the  least  moment  to  the  Salt  Lickers.  Day 
by  day  she  expected  her  recall  to  the  Stackpole  kitchen, 
and  when  a  week,  a  fortnight,  a  month  passed  without  the 
summons,  she  could  restrain  her  anxious  curiosity  no 
longer.  Old  Mrs.  Stackpole  might  have  died,  any  thing 
might  have  happened  in  the  absence  of  the  grand  vizier. 
She  therefore  took  the  train  one  morning  and  unsum- 
moned  returned  to  the  village.  The  old  people  were 
going  out  for  a  drive  on  the  Roundabout.  Spicer  stood 
at  the  door.  Presently  they  came  forth,  attended  by  the 
daughter-in-law  in  a  charming  white  morning  costume. 
They  mounted  the  chaise  without  assistance,  and  Minty 


VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

remarked  that  they  seemed  unusually  young  and  spry. 
Even  Spicer  moved  off  briskly  with  nothing  more  than  a 
pat  from  Mrs.  Fielding's  fair  hand.  Minty  reconnoitred 
the  house  in  a  state  of  mental  collapse.  All  looked  calm 
and  peaceful.  No  domestic  earthquake  had  shaken  the 
foundations  because  of  her  absence.  She  stole  round  to 
the  kitchen.  Phemy  Jones,  a  young  thing  she  knew  quite 
well,  was  standing  in  the  door.  Phemy  Jones  to  come 
after  her  !  The  thought  of  the  course  of  bad  cooking  the 
Stackpoles  had  gone  through  gave  Araminta  Sophronia  a 
feeling  of  exultation.  Phemy  met  her  with  no  outward 
sign  of  deference,  and  she  walked  into  the  kitchen  and 
looked  about  with  lynx  eyes. 

"  And  do  you  do  the  cooking  for  the  family,  Phemy 
Jones  ?  "  she  asked  sotto  voce.  "  I'm  a  learner,"  responded 
Phemy,  evasively.  "And  pray,  who  is  teaching  you,  Phemy 
Jones  ?"  "  Young  Mrs.  Stackpole.  She  is  a  splendid 
cook,  and  the  old  people  are  just  in  love  with  her.  Every 
body  says  they  are  growing  young  again."  Minty  arose 
in  a  dazed  way,  shook  her  skirts,  and  went  out  of  the 
door.  The  first  person  she  encountered  on  the  garden 
path  was  Fielding  Stackpole  with  a  satirical  smile  on  his 
face,  as  he  looked  into  the  eyes  of  his  old  enemy. 

"  I  hope  you  are  satisfied  now,"  she  blurted  out,  with 
a  feeling  of  hot  tears  in  her  eyes. 

"  Oh,  yes,"  returned  Fielding,  "  perfectly  satisfied, 
Minty.  I  married  the  head  scholar  in  the  Boston  Cook 
ing  School  ;  and  I  knew  I  was  safe." 

Minty  has  taken  another  situation  in  the  village,  but 
her  glory  has  departed.  She  no  longer  hopes  to  be  buried 
in  the  Stackpole  lot  and  to  have  a  coffin-plate  equal  to 
that  of  her  old  master. 


CHAPTER  XXXIII. 

THE     HOL  WORTHY     GIRLS. 

sound  of  the  wind  in  the  thick-leaved  trees  is  a 
J.  perpetual  inspiration  this  month,  when  most  of  the 
birds  are  silent,  and  only  shrill-voiced  insects — cicada, 
grasshopper,  and  cricket — make  a  strident  chorus.  The 
wind  symphony  lasts  sometimes  a  whole  day  and  part  of 
a  night,  and  comes  between  those  great  calm  pauses  of 
silent  weather  when  the  sunlight  falls  unclouded  for 
hours,  and  the  hills  steep  in  richness  of  color.  Then  the 
sun  departs  like  ruddy  metal  dropped  suddenly  behind 
the  hills,  and  the  still  moon  steps  in  and  fills  the  dew- 
dripping  night  full  of  mysterious  light  and  black 
shadows. 

But  in  these  dry  wind-storms  there  is  a  great  swaying 
of  trees  and  skurrying  of  clouds.  The  bustle  among  the 
airy-tongued  leaves  is  contagious.  You  lie  on  your  bed 
at  night  and  seem  to  rock  in  the  branches.  Your  spirit 
goes  forth  to  partake  of  the  excitement,  the  wild  glee, 
the  sad  wailing  of  nature.  The  moon  looks  out  at  inter 
vals  through  the  rack  like  some  lone  goddess — a  Psyche 
who  has  lost  her  love.  You  feel  that  a  great  change 
must  have  come  over  the  world  with  all  this  business 
progressing  through  the  night,  but  when  you  rise  there 
are  the  splendid  blue  hills  firm  on  their  foundations, 
with  the  clouds  dazzling  in  glory,  as  the  sun  peeps  from 
behind  them,  and  the  shadows  flee  across  the  slopes. 

The  earth  must  soon  feel  those  first  twinges  of  rheumatic 
pains  that  come  after  the  long  summer  of  bliss.  She 
will  ripen  now  like  an  apple  or  a  plum.  She  will  have  a 


312  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

dressy  autumn  and  a  calm  golden  old  age  before  the 
snow  flies.  The  first  tree  in  our  region  to  turn  from 
crown  to  base  is  the  tall  rock-maple  that  stands  on  a 
high  plateau  to  the  north  of  the  village.  As  soon  as  the 
Holworthy  maple  has  reddened  like  a  dome  of  fire  the 
other  trees  seem  to  light  their  torches  by  its  flame,  and 
one  can  day  by  day  watch  the  tides  of  color  rising  and 
advancing,  catching  and  flickering,  and  sparkling  all 
through  the  valley  and  on  the  hillsides.  For  this  reason 
it  has  become  an  autumn  beacon  to  the  country.  That 
red-and-yellow  signal  means  apple-gathering  and  cider- 
making,  nutting,  and  potato-digging  and  corn-husking 
in  the  fields,  and  the  dragging  of  cord-wood,  much  of 
which  is  used  in  our  primitive  kitchens,  and  the  lighting 
of  fall  fires. 

The  old  Holworthy  place  is  surrounded  by  an  excel 
lent  stone  wall,  but  the  land  is  rather  poor.  It  lies  spread 
out  on  the  hillside  like  an  old-fashioned  bed-quilt,  the 
fields  accurately  marked  off  by  light  and  dark  grain  and 
differing  shades  of  brown  and  yellow,  indicative  of 
plowed  ground,  fallow,  and  stubble.  In  the  south-west 
corner  just  now  there  is  a  lovely  patch,  of  the  blossomed 
buckwheat,  snow-white,  like  a  bleaching  napkin.  The 
pasture  is  all  up  the  mountain,  where  you  hear  the  cow 
bell  tinkling  in  the  sweet  fern  ;  and  there  are  but  one  or 
two  river  meadows  where  the  hay  is  gathered  late.  Old 
Amos  Holworthy's  grandfather  cleared  that  mountain 
farm,  and  old  Amos  thought  it  the  best  place  in  the 
world.  He  was  always  bragging  about  the  good  air  and 
the  excellent  mountain  spring  that  supplied  the  kitchen 
pump,  as  other  people  boast  of  their  riches  and  grandeur. 
The  view  from  the  place,  far  down  the  valley  with  the 
flanking  hills,  and  vista  upon  vista  of  blue  air,  until  the 
Wilton  Mountains  close  the  distance  like  cloudy  gates  to 
some  grand  city,  is  one  of  the  most  perfect  in  this  region. 
It  seems  to  satisfy  that  craving  for  a  vast  horizon,  an 


THE    THREE    CHRISTIAN  GRACES.  3*3 

outlook  toward  the  unknown,  of  which  Mr.  Ruskin 
speaks,  and  is  perhaps  one  of  the  secrets  of  the  strong 
attachment  which  all  the  Holworthys  have  ever  felt  for 
their  mountain  farm. 

The  three  Holworthy  girls  loved  it  as  the  Bronte  sis 
ters  loved  their  lonely  house  on  the  moor.  Their  love 
differed  from  that  of  the  old  man,  their  father,  for  with 
the  educated  consciousness  they  entered  into  all  the 
beauty  and  charm  of  the  place,  while  he  loved  the  soil, 
the  stones,  the  scrub-pines,  the  water  and  air,  but  never 
descanted  on  the  view,  except  to  say  it  was  a  sightly 
place,  and  that  "  his  gals  were  mighty  took  up  with 
sketchin'  the  scenery  and  botanizing,  and  the  Lordy 
knew  what."  Next  to  his  rugged  bit  of  a  farm  old  Hoi- 
worthy  was  proud  of  his  "  gals,"  although  with  great 
simplicity  he  confessed  he  did  not  understand  them.  He 
had  never  crossed  them  in  his  life,  neither  he  nor  his  old 
woman,  and  according  to  his  account  the  "  gals  "  always 
had  their  noses  buried  in  books  even  from  their  tenderest 
years.  Old  Holworthy  had  not  much  knowledge,  neither 
had  his  wife,  but  they  both  reverenced  the  love  of  it  in 
their  three  daughters,  Faith,  Hope  and  Charity,  as  they 
were  called,  after  the  three  Christian  graces. 

As  the  girls  desired  "  schoolin',"  the  old  folks  worked 
hard  to  give  it  them,  and  after  they  had  got  it  it  was  a 
pain  to  the  excellent  Holworthys  that  they  could  not 
always  keep  their  "  gals  to  hum."  No,  they  would  go  off 
West  and  South  instructing  the  freedmen  and  teaching 
in  academies,  and  only  once  or  twice  a  year  did  they 
then  gather  under  the  Holworthy  roof-tree.  They  always 
came  at  Thanksgiving,  these  girls  who  were  such  para 
gons  of  learning  in  the  eyes  of  the  old  folks.  The 
mother  was  what  is  called  in  the  country  a  "  driving 
woman."  She  dressed  in  a  short  skirt  and  sacque,  and 
wore  a  broad-brimmed  hat.  It  was  said  that  she  some 
times  smoked  a  short  black  pipe  up  the  chimney.  Her 


3J4  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

face  was  broad,  kindly,  and  brown  as  a  berry,  with  keen 
dark  eyes  set  deep  in  her  head.  She  made  the  garden, 
attended  to  the  farm  animals  and  the  poultry,  milked  the 
cows,  harnessed  the  horses,  and  often  drove  a  pair  to  the 
village  to  do  her  "  trading,"  or  to  the  mill  to  get  a  bag 
of  flour.  She  had  a  strong  frame  and  corresponding 
strength  of  sense.  The  old  man  looked  up  to  her  for 
her  practical  wisdom,  while  he  revered  that  remote  ideal 
bookish  realm  where  dwelt  his  family  of  remarkable 
girls.  Though  the  three  theological  virtues,  as  they 
were  called  in  the  village,  had  read  and  studied  a  good 
deal  in  certain  directions,  they  retained  the  simplicity 
and  unworldliness  of  children  of  nature.  Two  of  them 
were  plain  and  red-haired,  but  the  youngest,  Charity,  or 
Love,  as  her  friends  often  called  her,  was  a  beautiful 
woman,  even  in  her  maturity. 

The  sisters  had  taken  possession  of  the  roomy  garret 
and  transformed  it  into  a  general  study,  which  they  par 
titioned  off  by  cheap  curtains  for  use  when  they  wished 
to  be  alone.  The  views  from  all  the  garret  windows 
were  of  perfect  beauty.  Visitors  were  always  taken  up 
there  to  be  entertained,  and  then  the  three  sections  were 
thrown  into  one.  Charity  botanized  and  had  arranged 
her  herbarium  and  dried  plants  in  her  own  part  of  the 
garret.  When  she  was  at  home  this  section  was  adorned 
with  an  exquisite  arrangement  of  wild  grasses,  bright 
berries,  ferns,  lichens,  toad-stools,  and  rare  wild-flowers 
she  had  gathered  in  her  favorite  haunts  in  the  woods. 
Hope  sketched  somewhat.  The  window  of  her  rustic 
atelier  looked  far  down  the  valley.  She  pinned  her 
sketches  against  the  rafters  and  backed  them  with  bright 
bits  of  stuff,  giving  the  artist  touch  to  all  she  did. 
Along  the  chimney  and  side  walls  she  had  painted  a  vine 
which  seemed  to  come  through  the  scuttle  and  meander 
with  splashes  of  sunlight. 

Faith  was  always  writing  a  little  book  of  reflections 


FAITH'S  BOOK-ROOM.  315 

and  meditations  (not  for  publication),  but  resembling  the 
French  pense'es,  and  her  little  study  end  of  the  garret  was 
the  book-room,  fitted  up  with  braided  rugs,  patchwork 
cushions,  comfortable  seats,  and  bits  of  old  furniture 
which  had  been  put  away  as  too  antiquated  and  rickety 
for  the  lower  rooms.  All  the  girls  were  handy  with  tools. 
By  their  united  wit  they  had  contrived  to  transform  an 
old  bedstead  into  a  lounge,  and  with  hammer,  saw,  and 
nails  had  devised  a  handy  set  of  shelves  for  their  little 
library.  Here  were  all  their  small  treasures,  the  few 
choice  editions  of  the  classics  they  had  skimped  on  their 
plain  dress  to  buy,  the  gift-books  of  their  scholars,  and 
those  well-thumbed  favorites  among  the  older  poets, 
especially  Spenser  and  George  Herbert,  they  almost 
knew  by  heart.  They  brought  all  their  united  treasures 
to  make  Faith's  den  particularly  attractive.  For  Faith 
was  supposed  to  be  weakly  ;  at  least,  there  was  some 
constitutional  trouble  which  showed  itself  at  times.  At 
home  Faith  was  always  well.  It  was  only  when  absent 
from  her  native  air  that  she  drooped  and  seemed 
fragile  nature. 

Though  in  no  way  very  remarkable,  the  Ho 
girls  had  their  individual  modes  and  manners, 
dered  them  interesting.  When  they  sent  invitations 
their  friends  in  the  village  to  come  up  to  the  farm  to  tea, 
they  generally  fastened  the  note  with  a  chicken  feather. 
Charity,  the  naturalist,  had  a  signature  of  her  own,  a  zig 
zag  blurred  line,  supposed  to  resemble  the  track  made  by 
the  foot  of  an  ant  in  wet  sand.  The  billets  were  gener 
ally  in  rhyme,  and  were  often  addressed  in  some  peculiar 
and  fantastic  manner.  The  old  man,  who  delivered  his 
daughter's  missives,  though  he  was  immensely  proud  of 
them,  sometimes  felt  it  necessary  to  apologize  for  their 
queerness. 

"  Lordy,    now,"    he   would    say,    with    his    old    face 
screwed  into  a  puzzled  look,  "  I  don't  know  what  them 


3l6  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

gals  are  up  to.  They  have  so  many  notions  in  their 
heads,  I  don't  pretend  to  keep  track  of  'em." 

But  there  was  really  no  rupture  between  the  daughters 
and  the  old  people  such  as  is  so  often  seen  between  edu 
cated  children  and  their  hard-working,  rough-handed  old 
parents.  Though  Amos  Holworthy  was  always  assert 
ing  that  he  did  not  understand  his  "  gals,"  that  they 
were  miracles  of  learning  way  out  of  sight  of  him  and 
the  old  woman,  there  was  a  perfect  understanding,  a 
devoted  bond  of  amity  binding  the  whole  family  to 
gether.  The  girls  had  never  lost  their  taste  for  a  simple, 
primitive  mode  of  life  or  their  passion  for  nature.  They 
loved  the  old  home  so  well  it  was  hard  to  induce  them  to 
come  down  the  mountain  to  "  visit "  in  the  village. 
Their  friends  must  come  to  them.  They  hung  out  sig 
nals  from  their  station  on  the  hill  as  soon  as  they  arrived. 
Red  and  blue,  yellow  and  white  signals,  all  had  their 
special  meaning  to  various  friends  below.  An  excursion 
to  the  farm,  with  a  moonlight  drive  homeward  in  the 
evening,  was  always  a  much  enjoyed  event.  The  old 
people  were  so  hearty  and  kindly,  the  girls  were  so 
original  and  interesting  ;  such  a  visit  offered  a  new  ex 
perience. 

The  Holworthys  had  ways  of  their  own  for  doing 
every  thing.  Their  hospitality  was  boundless,  but  of  the 
simplest  kind.  The  girls  from  a  very  early  age  had  set 
their  faces  like  flint  against  the  diseased  New  England 
appetite  for  pie  and  sweet-cake.  They  never  offered 
either  to  their  guests.  In  the  village  not  to  have  pie  of 
every  variety  at  Thanksgiving,  and  not  to  offer  cake  on 
the  company  tea-table,  was  as  unorthodox  and  perhaps 
as  wicked  as  to  deny  the  doctrine  of  original  sin.  At  the 
Holworthys  there  was  always  an  abundance  of  nice 
bread,  fruit,  custards,  and  cheese,  milk,  cream,  eggs,  and 
honey.  They  set  the  fashion  of  putting  fresh  fruit  on 
the  table  at  a  time  when  people  thought  uncooked  fruit 


ON   THE   HEIGHTS.  317 

unwholesome,  fit  only  to  be  canned  or  preserved  with 
pound  for  pound  of  sugar.  The  girls  had  brought  old 
Mrs.  Holworthy  over  to  their  notions,  and  she  allowed  it 
did  save  a  "  sight  of  trouble."  Their  revolt  against  pie 
and  cake  was  set  down  as  one  of  their  least  excusable 
eccentricities.  But  a  day  at  the  Holworthy  farm,  when 
the  girls  were  at  home,  was  a  happy  event.  They  had  a 
small  microscope  to  show  the  structure  of  plants  and  the 
wonders  of  insect  life.  They  displayed  new  and  beauti 
ful  flowers  that  had  always  grown  in  your  home  fields, 
but  which  you  never  had  observed.  They  talked  over 
their  favorite  books  with  the  enthusiasm  of  students,  and 
with  the  keen  appreciation  of  nature  which  only  born 
lovers  can  feel,  they  led  you  to  the  different  beautiful 
points  of  view — the  lookout,  sunset  rock,  the  little  ice 
glen,  and  through  the  wood-path  to  their  fernery. 

These  simple  girls  in  their  loose  comfortable  gowns  of 
plain  stuff  lived  literally  on  the  heights.  When  they 
came  home  it  was  always  tacitly  understood  among  them 
that  they  were  to  relieve  mother  with  the  housework,  and 
give  her  a  chance  to  go  away  and  visit  Aunt  Gill,  who 
lived  about  fifty  miles  distant  on  the  railroad.  The  old 
lady  had  never  been  in  a  rail-car.  The  wonders  of  the 
steam-engine  had  been  explained  to  her  by  the  girls. 
She  had  often  gazed  upon  the  engine  and  the  train  at  a 
safe  distance  from  the  village  station,  when  she  had 
driven  her  team  into  the  town.  Her  going  to  see  Sister 
Gill  on  the  railroad  was  really  a  fiction,  a  dream,  some 
thing  she  cherished  in  her  fancy  without  ever  attempting 
to  carry  it  out.  So  the  strong  brown-faced  old  woman 
continued  to  work  hard  until  she  died  quite  suddenly 
and  was  buried  in  the  little  family  burying-ground  on 
the  mountain. 

It  was  a  hard  blow  to  the  old  man.  He  could  not 
understand  his  "  gals,"  that  he  admitted  ;  but  he  knew 
every  .fold  and  involution  of  his  wife's  mind,  and  he 


318  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

missed  her  sadly.  His  "  gals  "  were  the  pride  of  his 
soul,  but  the  industrious,  strong  old  wife  was  a  necessity, 
like  the  air  and  water  of  the  mountain.  Just  at  this  time 
Abel  Holworthy,  his  rich  brother  in  California,  died  and 
left  him  five  thousand  dollars.  At  once  the  whole  aspect 
of  his  life  was  changed.  He  was  a  rich  man  for  the 
mountain,  and  he  summoned  his  girls  to  come  and  live  at 
home  permanently.  It  cost  Faith  a  pang  to  give  up  her 
colored  school  in  North  Carolina,  but,  like  her  sisters,  she 
obeyed  the  mandate  to  come  home — no  more  to  roam 
abroad — to  live  with  the  solitary  old  man,  and  to  make 
him  forget  his  loss  if  possible. 

The  only  thing  he  ever  said  about  his  wealth  was,  "  I 
wish  mother  could  have  lived  to  see  it.  I  wish  she  had 
taken  that  there  journey  to  Sister  Gill's.  That's  a  thing 
that  hangs  round  my  neck  and  hectors  me.  She  never 
rode  on  them  cars,  and  I  kind  of  think  if  I  had  in 
sisted  she  would  have  trusted  herself  to  steam  naviga 
tion.  My  gals  don't  think  as  I  do  about  steam  naviga 
tion,  that  it's  one  of  the  wonders  of  the  airth.  I've  heard 
them  say  for  their  part  they'd  jest  as  soon  there  wasn't 
any.  But  I  guess  they  were  joking."  "  Steam  naviga 
tion  "  and  the  thermometer  were  the  two  great  scien 
tific  delights  of  old  Amos.  He  kept  a  thermometer 
on  the  back  porch,  consulted  it  several  times  a 
day,  and  tried  faithfully  to  regulate  his  sensations  by  it. 

Every  Sunday  the  old  man  harnessed  his  team  and 
brought  his  family  down  to  the  village  church,  where  he 
fastened  his  horses  under  the  long  shed  attached  to  the 
sanctuary.  Invariably  he  fell  asleep  in  a  corner  of  the 
pew,  and  emitted  so  much  nasal  melody  it  took  some 
thing  more  than  a  strong  nudge  to  bring  him  to  the  con 
sciousness  that  he  was,  as  one  of  the  neighbors  expressed 
it,  "  running  an  opposition  to  the  minister."  His  con 
stant  labors  in  the  open  air  on  the  mountain  top,  so  much 
more  invigorating  than  in  our  own  valley,  produced 


CHARITY  HAD   "  OFFERS"  319 

somnolence  at  once  when  he  came  in-doors.  On  a  cer 
tain  Sunday,  only  two  or  three  years  before  he  died,  a 
somewhat  celebrated  clergyman  of  a  metaphysical  cast 
of  mind  exchanged  with  the  village  parson.  Good  old 
Father  Holworthy  slept  the  sleep  of  the  just  throughout 
the  sermon,  which  certainly  was  somewhat  abstruse  for  a 
plain  country  congregation.  On  coming  out  of  meeting 
one  of  his  friends  tapped  him  on  the  shoulder  and 
inquired  how  he  liked  the  sermon.  "  It  was  a  splendid 
discourse,"  said  the  old  man  enthusiastically,  "  but, 
Lordy,  I  didn't  understand  a  word  on't  ;  my  gals  did 
though.  They  took  it  all  in,  and  we  shall  have  it  laid  up 
in  the  family." 

Now  that  the  Holworthy  girls  were  at  home,  with  the 
design  of  spending  the  remainder  of  their  lives  on  the 
mountain  farm,  and  with  a  small  increase  of  fortune,  they 
gradually  re-arranged  the  house  to  suit  their  tastes.  The 
rag  carpets  were  not  banished,  nor  any  of  the  quaint  old 
furniture,  but  the  florid,  high-colored  Scripture  prints 
their  mother  had  delighted  in  were  removed,  and  some 
engravings  of  a  higher  order  substituted.  Hope  indulged 
her  fancy  in  painting  the  quaint  old  wooden  chimney- 
pieces  with  the  vines  and  berries  and  wild  flowers  her 
sister  brought  from  the  woods.  Books  spread  all  over 
the  lower  part  of  the  house,  and  the  old  man  was  seen  to 
be  a  little  better  clad  and  brushed  than  of  old. 

The  daughters  led  a  simple  life  of  enjoyment  of  nature, 
contemplation,  and  study  combined  with  homely  house 
hold  duties — such  a  combination  as  is  scarcely  to  be 
found  out  of  New  England.  Charity,  the  beautiful 
sister,  with  her  dark  eyes,  abundant  curling  brown  hair, 
and  lithe  figure,  certainly  had  "  offers."  Two  at  least 
were  known  to  the  villagers,  but  the  banner  of  matrimony 
was  never  flung  from  the  farm-house  along  with  the  red, 
blue,  white  and  yellow  signals  with  which  they  tele 
graphed  to  their  friends  below.  The  prosperous  mer- 


3 20  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

chant  widower,  or  well-to-do  farmer  who  came  up  the 
mountain  in  the  hope  of  winning  Charity  found  that 
Charity  was  bent  on  remaining  at  home,  and  the  journey 
had  been  made  in  vain.  It  was  wise  for  those  maidens 
to  refuse  to  be  transplanted.  They  never  could  any 
where  have  been  so  happy  or  so  charming  as  on  their 
native  soil.  They  were  rooted  in  the  mountain  earth 
like  those  delicate  growths,  the  arbutus,  the  harebell,  the 
gentian,  and  the  fragile,  lovely  ferns. 

The  old  man  died  peacefully  one  day  on  the  place 
where  he  had  lived,  convinced  to  his  last  hour  there  was 
no  such  air  and  water  anywhere  as  could  be  found  on  the 
mountain,  except,  perhaps,  in  the  New  Jerusalem.  They 
had  a  simple  funeral  on  a  beautiful  June  morning,  and 
for  a  long  time  the  girls  kept  the  old  man's  grave  in  the 
family  plot  covered  with  blooming  laurel  and  other  wild 
flowers.  Hope,  the  middle  sister,  also  has  passed  on  by 
some  mild  and  painless  disease.  She  died  sitting  in  her 
chair,  making  some  little  gift  for  Charity,  and  her  needle 
remains  sticking  in  her  work,  just  as  she  left  it  when 
death  knocked  at  the  door.  Her  Testament  was  turned 
down  at  the  passage,  "  To  die  is  gain." 

Now  there  are  but  two  Holworthys  left,  white-haired 
women  living  in  their  sheltered  nook,  cheerful  and  happy. 
I  have  had  the  privilege  of  looking  into  Faith's  unpub 
lished  book  of  meditations,  and  I  recall  one  passage  : 
"  If  the  flower  is  perfect  the  fruit  will  be  sound  and 
good.  If  the  fruit  mature  it  will  produce  a  healthy  seed. 
Each  succeeding  period  of  life  is  one  of  progress.  Death 
belongs  to  the  series,  but  we  must  take  a  step  in  the 
dark  to  behold  the  new  blossom.  Death  is  the  mold  in 
which  the  ripe  seed  is  buried.  Let  us  await  joyfully  the 
springing  of  that  immortal  germ." 


CHAPTER  XXXIV. 

THE    MOST    POPULAR    GIRL    IN    THE    VILLAGE. 

LIKE  all  other  properly  constituted  communities  we 
have  our  great  men,  who,  living  or  dead,  we  cherish 
with  commendable  pride. 

We  have  produced  a  showman,  a  great  patent-medi 
cine  man,  the  editor  of  a  daily  paper,  the  inventor  of  a 
pump,  a  story- writer  of  the  school  of  Sylvanus  Cobb,  Jr., 
a  funny  man  who  is  thought  to  have  gone  ahead  of  all 
others  in  the  art  of  distorted  spelling,  and  a  sensational 
preacher.  Our  slow,  bovine  virtues  are  far  less  exciting 
to  the  mind  of  youth  than  the  merits  of  the  patent-medi 
cine  man,  for  instance,  who  is  supposed  to  have  made 
from  a  common  weed  and  some  poor  spirits  a  nostrum 
warranted  to  cure  consumption  and  cancer.  This  man 
has  amassed  an  enormous  fortune.  He  does  not  live  in 
an  ordinary  plutocrat's  mansion,  but  in  a  palace  where  he 
draws  his  hot  and  cold  water  from  solid  silver  faucets. 
The  story  of  his  great  riches  and  the  luxury  of  his  bath 
room  is  almost  as  alluring  to  the  young  mind  of  our  vil 
lage  as  the  tale  of  the  great  defaulter  who  managed  to 
escape  to  Canada  with  nearly  a  million  of  dollars. 

Besides  those  among  us  who  have  already  achieved 
greatness  and  come  to  happy  fame  and  the  immortality  of 
the  newspaper,  are  those  rising  people  who  we  expect  may 
yet  achieve  something  considerable — the  promising  young 
men,  the  ambitious  maidens  of  native  growth  who  are 
yet  to  illustrate  our  annals  and  add  luster  to  the  village 
name.  Among  these  is  a  young  professional  man,  the 
son  of  an  old  resident,  who  was  graduated  with  some 
tclat  at  his  college,  and  is  now  connected  with  an  excel- 


322  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

lent  law  firm  in  one  of  our  larger  cities.  Why  great 
hopes  have  been  placed  on  the  future  of  Ned  Buckner  it 
is  not  easy  to  discover.  He  is  good  looking,  has  easy 
manners,  is  tonguey,  with  great  readiness  in  displaying 
all  he  knows.  He  has  corresponded  for  a  newspaper, 
and  even  written  leading  articles  ;  and  the  old  people  say 
he  can  lie  in  print  like  a  lightning-rod  man  or  a  book- 
agent.  All  Ned  Buckner  possesses  is  readily  made 
available  ;  and  it  is  firmly  believed  in  the  village  that  he 
is  endowed  with  the  great  American  virtue  of  getting  on. 
When  in  college  he  never  had  the  slightest  modesty  in 
approaching  the  wisest  and  most  venerated  men  of  the 
day  with  familiar  ease.  As  a  stripling  he  could  ruffle  it 
with  the  best,  and  now  he  talks  of  celebrities  as  if  he  were 
hand  in  glove  with  them. 

Ned  Buckner  was  always  very  successful  with  the  fair 
sex — the  girls  of  his  village.  Though  for  several  years 
he  was  considered  as  good  as  engaged  to  Sylvia  Macy, 
still  he  was  a  prize  the  other  maidens  were  not  willing  to 
abandon  without  a  struggle.  In  a  community  where 
every  other  place  is  owned  and  occupied  by  an  unmarried 
woman  or  a  widow  tax-payer,  a  man  like  Ned  Buckner  is 
sure  to  stumble  into  pit-falls  unless  he  is  extremely  wary. 
Ned  has  never  been  wary.  He  has  given  all  the  prettiest 
girls  in  the  village — those  with  whom  he  was  brought  up 
and  whom  he  called  by  their  Christian  names — reason  to 
think  he  was  fond  of  them.  And  I  have  no  doubt  he 
was.  Seven  or  eight  of  them  wore  his  college  colors, 
and  were  intensely  excited  over  the  boat  races  and  other 
contests  in  which  he  took  part.  How  it  came  at  length 
to  be  understood  that  he  was  engaged  to  Sylvia  I  hardly 
know.  She  was  one  of  the  most  modest,  quiet  girls  in  the 
village  ;  still  of  tongue  and  unobtrusive  in  every  way. 
Ned  had  played  with  her  when  they  were  children 
together  ;  had  dragged  her  to  school  on  his  sled  ;  had 
given  her  bites  out  of  his  apple  behind  the  desk,  and  had 


SYLVIA    AND   FREDDIE.  323 

done  her  sums  for  her  on  the  sly.  For  Sylvia  was  singu 
larly  unmathematical.  I  am  not  sure  that  she  ever  fully 
mastered  the  multiplication  tabbs.  But  she  grew  into  a 
young  woman  whom  every  one  loved  and  trusted. 

Some  time  after  the  engagement  of  Ned  Buckner  and 
Sylvia  was  tacitly  accepted  in  the  village,  most  of  the 
wearers  of  Ned's  colors  gave  up  hope.  Some  married 
and  others  settled  into  the  calm  of  single  blessedness, 
devoting  themselves  to  the  Bible-class  and  the  Sunday- 
school,  or  to  foreign  missions.  Nearly  all  discontentedly 
relinquished  the  rising  young  man  to  a  girl  whom  they 
unanimously  considered  plain.  There  was  one  excep 
tion.  Fredonia  Haven  was  ironically  called  the  most 
popular  girl  in  the  village — popular  among  the  men, 
while  the  women,  with  their  usual  maliciousness,  could 
see  nothing  attractive  in  her.  Miss  Freddie  was  consid 
ered  in  the  village  just  a  little  fast.  Cautious  matrons 
said  she  actually  made  eyes  at  their  husbands  ;  but  I 
don't  believe  it.  Her  iniquity  chiefly  consisted  in  hav- 
^g  smoked  cigarettes  with  one  of  her  admirers,  which 
made  her  rather  ill.  She  liked  fast  horses  and  rather 
showy  costumes.  She  was  skillful  at  all  kinds  of  games, 
and  had  won  various  prizes  in  archery  and  tennis.  Her 
clothes  always  fitted  her  to  perfection,  for  she  had  great 
skill  in  dressmaking,  and  it  was  her  habit  to  spring 
something  entirely  new  and  original  upon  the  neighbors 
which  could  not  readily  be  copied.  The  most  severe 
charge  brought  against  Freddie  Haven  was  that  she  did 
not  care  for  women,  a  woman's  love  for  her  own  sex  be 
ing  the  touchstone  always  applied  to  aspirants  for  female 
favor.  Freddie  frankly  declared  that  she  liked  men 
better.  And  they  liked  her,  old  and  young,  grand 
fathers,  fathers  of  families,  the  middle-aged,  and  boys 
in  their  salad  days.  At  one  time  she  had  had  great 
success  with  the  clergy.  Freddie  had  spent  part  of  her 
girlhood  in  a  college  town,  where  large  numbers  of 


324  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

the  youth  of  the  land  were  victims  of  her  bow  and 
spear.  Such  a  collection  of  boy  trophies  as  Freddie 
possessed  was  not  held  b.y  any  other  girl  in  the  village. 

But  these  were  only  tokens  of  her  pastime.  The  seri 
ous  affairs  of  Miss  Freddie's  varied  life  had  been  enacted 
with  Ned  Buckner  and  a  few  others.  Her  boy  friends 
were  wont  to  complain  that  first  she  used  them,  then 
amused  them,  and  at  last  abused  them.  So  many  boys 
had  offered  her  undying  affection,  it  was  one  of  her  di 
versions  to  read  over  their  love-letters  with  her  maturer 
lovers.  No  pent-up  Utica  like  one  small  village  could 
afford  a  fitting  sphere  for  a  person  of  Freddie's  genius. 
She  carried  her  conquests  into  neighboring  towns  and 
cities,  and  often  spent  whole  months  in  the  place  where 
Ned  Buckner  was  practicing  his  profession.  Then 
every  body  pitied  Sylvia  Macy,  though  the  village 
breathed  freer  when  she  was  out  of  it.  On  her  return 
the  matrons  ruffled  their  feathers,  or  looked  sharply  after 
their  lords.  The  marriage  of  Freddie  Haven,  it  was 
conceded,  would  be  a  public  benefaction  ;  but  while  she 
was  still  free  and  able  to  roam  at  large,  there  was  no 
telling  where  the  lightning  might  strike.  No  one  in 
Freddie's  family  was  able  to  control  her.  She  lived  with 
a  married  sister  who  was  buried  up  in  a  large  family  of 
children  ;  and  her  brother-in-law,  it  was  thought,  was  a  lit 
tle  too  indulgent  toward  her.  Freddie  had  independent 
means  of  her  own,  and  could  do  as  she  pleased.  No  wonder 
she  kept  the  village  stirred  up  !  Of  course  many  things 
were  said  of  her  by  malicious  tongues  that  had  no  found 
ation  in  fact.  It  is  to  be  taken  for  granted  that  a  per 
son  of  the  Freddie  type,  in  a  small  village,  is  never  so 
black  as  she  is  painted. 

Freddie's  sister's  house  stood,  as  we  say  in  the  coun 
try,  catacornering  to  the  house  where  Sylvia  Macy  lived 
with  her  widowed  mother  in  that  calm,  still  air  of  refine 
ment  and  respectability  which  surrounds  the  best  peo- 


FREDDIE'S  HOUR   OF   TRIUMPH.  325 

pie,  the  elect  of  the  village.  From  the  windows  ot  one 
house  it  was  easy  to  see  whoever  entered  the  door  of  the 
other.  Freddie  had  tried  to  train  a  screen  of  vines  over 
her  porch  on  the  Macy  side,  but  it  "  winter  killed  "  so 
often  she  finally  abandoned  the  effort.  Her  deeds  must 
stand  uncovered  before  the  eyes  of  the  Macys,  and  she 
was  not  ashamed.  There  were  many  hours  of  triumph 
for  Freddie,  though  she  was  not  quite  young  now.  In 
deed,  it  was  necessary  to  begin  to  study  the  art  of 
"  making  up."  But,  although  Ned  Buckner  was  engaged 
to  Sylvia,  he  always  spent,  when  he  came  to  town,  con 
siderable  time  with  Freddie  Haven.  He  never  meant  to 
spend  any  time  with  the  most  popular  girl  in  the  village, 
but  when  you  have  a  certain  intimacy  with  a  girl  of  that 
kind  how  are  you  to  help  yourself  ? 

If  he  passed  Freddie's  house  early  in  the  morn 
ing  there  she  was,  gathering  flowers  in  the  garden, 
or  singing  his  favorite  song  at  the  piano  in  the  par 
lor,  or  sitting  on  the  shady  porch  in  a  perfect  cos 
tume,  engaged  on  a  large  rich  piece  of  embroidery 
which  represented  a  spider's  web  in  a  blackberry  bush, 
with  the  spider  at  home,  and  a  fly  sending  in  his  card. 
The  whole  thing  was  very  quaint  conceit,  but  it  was 
wonderfully  suggestive.  Freddie  beckoned  him  in  the 
most  natural  way,  and  then  he  lost  his  will-power,  and 
during  his  stay  at  home  he  boated,  and  walked,  and 
dawdled  a  certain  amount  with  Freddie,  while  Sylvia 
was  supposed  to  be  watching  in  jealous  rage  through  the 
blinds  of  an  upper  window.  But  this  was  false.  Sylvia 
would  scorn  to  spy  on  any  one.  When  Ned  was  in  the 
village  she  and  her  polite,  high-bred  old  mother  never 
mentioned  Freddie  Haven's  name.  They  shut  their  ears 
to  all  gossip,  though  of  course  they  did  keep  up  a  con 
stant  thinking. 

But  things  could  not  go  on  always  in  this  fashion. 
Ned  would  have  liked  to  let  them  slide.  It  was  flatter- 


326  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

ing  to  his  vanity  to  be  the  center  of  talk,  the  person  on 
whom  all  eyes  turned,  the  object  of  intense  interest  to 
two  such  women  as  Sylvia  and  Freddie.  But  the  crisis 
came  one  sunset  hour,  when  the  fields  were  brown,  the 
roads  dusty,  the  mountains  hazy  with  amethystine  mists. 
A  great  wing  of  dove-colored  cloud  rested  over  Saddle 
back,  and  beneath  it  the  vivid  beams  darted  forth  like  a 
sheaf  of  thunder-bolts  held  in  Jove's  strong  hand.  Then 
came  a  sudden  sunburst,  and  the  calm  fields,  the  river, 
the  woods,  touched  with  the  afterglow,  turned  to  fire. 
The  river  ran  crimson  between  black  banks.  The  fields 
were  ensanguined  to  their  deepest  clods.  Every  bush 
and  stone  and  bit  of  crooked  fence  turned  to  ebony  out 
of  the  light.  The  gleam  strayed  down  the  country  road. 
It  caught  the  under  leaves,  where  the  boughs  were  trans 
parent,  and  they  seemed  to  break  into  flame  ;  then  the 
glow'faded,  except  in  the  west.  Shadows  climbed  the 
sky.  The  river  still  ran  crimson  in  the  coal-black  land, 
and  in  the  very  heart  of  the  red  stream  glided  a  little  boat. 
Two  people  were  in  the  boat.  You  , could  just  see 
their  outlines  by  the  fading  light.  A  young  man  and 
a  maiden  rowed  on  that  glowing  stream,  while  the 
evening  breeze  began  to  ruffle  the  trees  up  the  bank, 
and  brought  the  odors  of  the  fields.  The  young  man 
was  tall,  and  he  bent  to  the  oar.  The  maiden  sat 
like  a  statue  in  the  stern  of  the  boat.  Not  a  word  seemed 
to  pass  between  them.  They  came  to  the  landing-place 
on  the  little  pebbly  beach  under  the  water  willow.  Silently 
the  rower  leaped  to  shore,  drew  in  the  boat,  and  handed 
the  lady  out.  They  walked  up  the  bank  in  the  soft, 
creeping  shadows,  just  as  lights  began  to  twinkle  in  the 
village  houses,  and  shone  with  a  mysterious  charm 
through  the  dusky  elm  trees.  They  had  not  spoken  a  word 
as  they  turned  into  Main  Street,  and  he  opened  the  gate 
of  a  pretty  cottage  ;  then  she  turned  her  face  toward  him, 
rather  to  look  goodnight  than  with  the  intention  of  speech. 


SHALL    SHE   SACRIFICE  HERSELF?  327 

Freddie  had  crept  down  to  the  boat-landing  by  the 
bridge  in  the  middle  of  the  afternoon,  when  most  of  the 
village  gossips  were  napping.  There  had  been  no 
definite  appointment  made  with  Ned  Buckner,  but  she 
knew  he  would  be  there.  She  was  dressed  in  a  white 
flannel  boating-gown,  with  a  large  bunch  of  brilliant  red 
flowers  in  her  bodice,  and  a  hat  of  the  most  stylish  trim. 
Ned  was  lounging  about  the  river  bank  when  she  arrived 
in  the  most  natural  way,  and  they  stepped  into  the  boat 
and  pushed  off  to  a  woody  part  of  the  river,  where  several 
aged  hemlocks  hung  low  over  the  stream.  It  was  only 
in  the  black  velvety  and  crimson  gloaming  that  Freddie 
sprang  her  secret  upon  Ned.  Before  that  hour  she  had 
been  pensive  at  moments,  at  others  rather  wildly  gay. 
But  now  she  told  him  with  solemn — almost  tragic — 
earnestness  that  he  must  decide  her  fate.  She  had  been 
importuned  to  marry  a  Polish  count,  who  was  then  meta 
phorically  on  his  knees  before  her.  With  a  tremor  in 
her  voice  and  tears  in  her  fine  eyes  she  confessed  she  did 
not  love  the  count ;  but  if  Ned  advised  her  to  marry  him 
she  would  meekly  sacrifice  herself.  She  would  go  like  a 
victim  to  the  altar,  and  bestow  her  hand,  though  her 
heart  was  not  in  it.  She  did  not  wish  Ned  to  give  pre 
cipitate  counsel.  He  was  to  come  to  her  house  the  next 
afternoon,  and  they  would  talk  the  matter  over  calmly 
and  dispassionately. 

Ned  Buckner  felt  dazed  when  he  suddenly  found  him 
self  in  a  trap.  He  had  been  sailing  along  gayly  with 
these  two  girls  both  in  love  with  him,  and  now  there  was 
to  be  a  sharp  game  played  upon  him,  from  which  it 
would  require  all  his  lawyer  wit  to  extricate  himself. 
This  was  the  situation  when  he  and  Freddie  walked  in 
perfect  silence  up  the  bank  to  the  village  street,  and 
parted  without  a  word  at  the  gate.  Ned  wandered  about 
awhile  in  the  dusk  smoking  a  cigar.  He  felt  sulky  and 
injured  in  his  most  sacred  affections.  He  could  see  no 


3  28  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

way  out  of  his  present  scrape  but  to  give  up  one  of  his 
girls.  And  this  he  particularly  disliked  to  do,  for  at  that 
moment  he  was  almost  equally  fond  of  both.  Suddenly 
he  remembered  that  he  had  an  engagement  to  take  tea 
that  very  evening  with  his  other  girl,  Sylvia  Macy.  He 
went  home  and  dressed  himself  with  great  care  in  even 
ing  toilet. 

The  Macy  house  is  one  of  the  pleasantest  in  the  vil 
lage.  Now  the  lamps  were  lighted  and  the  tea-table  was 
set  out  with  a  choice  array  of  flowers.  Such  a  refined 
tea-table  is  a  mirror  of  the  mind  of  the  mistress.  On 
that  table  there  was  never  too  much,  nothing  so  exquisite 
as  to  detract  from  the  pleasures  of  good  conversation, 
yet  the  food  had  an  aroma  of  its  own.  Ned  was  a  little 
late,  but  Sylvia  met  him  in  the  wide  old-fashioned  hall  in 
the  sweetest  temper.  She,  too,  was  in  white — a  diapha 
nous  robe  with  a  few  sprays  of  the  fragrant  honeysuckle 
at  her  belt.  Ned  had  never  seen  her  look  so  charming 
in  her  choice  simplicity.  The  whole  atmosphere  of  the 
house  affected  his  impressionable  nature  like  some  deli 
cate  perfumed  wine.  The  old  lady,  so  dignified,  benevo 
lent,  and  wise,  sitting  at  the  head  of  the  table,  was  all  his 
aesthetic  instinct  desired.  Ned  felt  himself  to  be  almost 
as  much  in  love  with  her  as  he  had  ever  been  with  either 
Sylvia  or  Freddie.  It  was  partly  the  desire  to  be  son-in- 
law  to  old  Madam  Macy  that  had  won  him  over  to  an 
engagement.  In  her  presence  he  felt  virtuous,  noble, 
almost  religious.  The  fact  that  she  believed  in  him  was 
like  a  back-stay  to  his  character. 

Sylvia  had  never  looked  so  well  as  on  this  particular 
night.  There  was  a  slight  flush  on  her  cheek,  her  eyes 
were  of  a  deep,  still  brightness,  and  her  blonde  hair  shone 
golden.  Ned  was  a  captivating  talker  when  he  chose  to 
be,  and  now  he  exerted  himself  to  fascinate  those  two 
women.  It  was  only  when  he  found  himself  alone  in  the 
parlor  with  Sylvia  that  some  consciousness  of  what  he  was 


SYLVIA'S   OFFER.  329 

swept  over  him.  Old  Mrs.  Macy  in  saying  good-night 
had  put  her  hand  affectionately  on  his  shoulder.  He 
knew  she  trusted  him,  and  for  a  minute  he  was  ashamed. 
He  looked  shyly  at  Sylvia.  How  natural,  pure,  and  good 
she  was  in  her  easy  gown,  free  and  untortured.  She 
wore  no  false  locks  ;  she  knew  nothing  of  cosmetics  and 
"  making  up  ";  she  was  as  natural  and  true  as  a  mountain 
brook.  Ned  half  suspected  he  was  a  scoundrel.  Now 
Sylvia  sang  and  played  for  him  on  the  old  piano  without 
any  of  the  foreign  airs  and  graces  of  execution  which 
Freddie  possessed.  They  sat  together  and  talked  of  in 
different  things.  But  at  last  Ned,  though  he  was  half 
afraid  of  this  simple  girl  to  whom  he  had  been  engaged 
two  years,  drew  a  little  nearer,  seated  himself  on  the  sofa 
beside  her,  and  ventured  to  take  her  hand.  Sylvia  blushed 
deeply.  There  was  a  constrained  silence.  Then  she  said, 
trying  to  steady  her  voice  : 

"  Ned,  dear,  there  has  been  something  on  my  mind  this 
good  while  I  wished  to  say  to  you,  and  yet  I  hardly  know 
how  to  say  it.  I  have  felt  that — that  possibly  you  might 
choose  to  take  back  your  word  and  to  be  free  again. 
Perhaps — that  is — you  may  not  quite  have  known  your 
own  mind  when  you  asked  me  to  marry  you." 

She  was  too  delicate  to  mention  Freddie  Haven's  name, 
but,  of  course,  Ned  knew  that  she  knew  all  about  Freddie. 
She  slipped  the  engaged  ring  from  her  ringer  and  held  it 
out  to  him.  What  could  a  man  with  a  spark  of  honor  and 
decency  do  but  refuse  to  take  the  ring  and  try  to  comfort 
and  reassure  the  girl  to  whom  he  had  plighted  his  troth  ? 
She  gently  put  aside  his  caresses,  though  she  did  allow 
him  to  slip  the  ring  back  on  her  finger. 

"  Remember,"  she  said,  as  they  parted  at  the  door, 
"  you  are  to  think  it  all  over  very  seriously.  Come  to  me 
to-morrow  afternoon,  and  we  will  have  a  long  talk.  Tell 
me  the  exact  truth.  Tell  me  all  there  is  in  your  heart." 

As  she  stood  there  she  looked  into  his  eyes  just  one 


33°  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

moment,  and  he  could  hardly  bear  her  gaze,  and  then  she 
shut  the  door.  Ned  Buckner  well  knew  what  her  words 
implied  ;  he  must  give  up  Freddie  Haven  forever  if  he 
would  retain  Sylvia.  When  he  found  himself  in  the  vil 
lage  street,  he  remembered  his  appointment  with  Freddie 
the  next  afternoon,  to  decide  her  fate.  Sylvia  had  ap 
pointed  the  same  hour  to  give  him  back  his  troth  if  he  so 
wished.  He  had  only  to  tell  her  that  he  loved  Freddie 
Haven,  loved  her  in  spite  of  his  better  self,  and  the  solu 
tion  was  easily  reached.  Sylvia  was  a  calm,  serene, 
placid  being.  She  would  not  break  her  heart  over  one 
disappointment  ;  but  now  he  remembered  he  had  at  times 
noted  a  depth  of  constancy  in  her  which  had  alarmed  him. 
He  recalled  her  every  attitude  of  the  evening — the  white 
clinging  gown,  the  faint  odor  of  the  honeysuckle,  her  pure, 
calm  face  and  gentle  tones.  It  was  plain  he  would  not 
give  her  up  without  a  struggle,  to  live  under  the  ban  of 
the  village  and  her  mother's  silent  reproach.  Then 
Freddie's  splendid  dark  eyes  came  flashing  toward  him, 
claiming  him  for  their  own. 

He  took  a  long  walk  into  the  country  and  tried  to 
think  the  thing  out.  But  there  was  no  use  in  thinking. 
It  was  hard  to  give  up  either  girl.  Both  seemed  neces 
sary  to  different  phases  of  his  nature.  At  last  he  decided 
to  leave  the  issue  to  chance.  The  moon  had  now  risen, 
and  bathed  the  dewy  world  in  radiance.  It  was  almost 
as  light  as  day.  He  plucked  two  pieces  of  grass  of  differ 
ing  lengths  ;  one  was  Sylvia,  the  other  Fredonia.  He 
arranged  them  in  his  hand  behind  his  back,  trying  not  to 
juggle  with — himself.  Then  he  drew  lots,  and  for  a  time 
dared  not  look  at  the  result.  When  he  did  he  found  that 
Sylvia  had  won.  He  walked  calmly  home  and  went  to 
bed.  A  paltry  character,  you  will  say.  Yes,  but  how  few 
of  us  seem  otherwise  than  paltry  when  the  inmost  fiber  of 
motive  is  dissected  !  How  few  of  us  are  heroes  and 
heroines  to  ourselves ! 


SHE  MUST  SETTLE    THE   QUESTION.          331 

The  next  day  Ned  Buckner  did  not  call  on  Freddie 
Haven.  He  decided  to  let  her  settle  the  question  to 
marry  or  not  to  marry  for  herself.  But  he  went  early  to 
visit  Sylvia,  and  so  effectually  allayed  all  her  doubts  and 
fears  that  the  wedding-day  was  appointed  for  the  follow 
ing  month.  Every  one  in  the  village  where  he  was  raised 
knows  that  Ned  Buckner,  though  a  brilliant  young  man, 
is  not  good  enough  for  Sylvia.  But  how  few  husbands 
are  good  enough  for  their  wives  in  the  estimation  of 
friends  ? 

Freddie  has  not  yet  married  the  Polish  count,  and 
some  people  think  he  is  a  pure  invention  of  her  brain. 
There  is  talk  of  her  going  into  the  Romish  Church. 
She  still  works  on  that  great  piece  of  embroidery  repre 
senting  the  spider's  v/eb  in  the  blackberry  bush  ;  but 
most  decidedly  it  would  not  do  for  an  altar-cloth. 


CHAPTER  XXXV. 

THE    MYSTERY    OF    STYLES    GARTH. 

THE  civilized  man  who  hides  in  the  forest  reverts  to 
half-savage  instincts.  He  takes  on  the  silence,  the 
stealthy  step,  the  cunning  of  the  Indian.  He  becomes 
mysterious  to  people  who  live  in  the  clearing  and  see 
more  daylight.  A  large  tract  of  forest  like  that  which 
stretches  away  from  the  north  end  of  the  village  called 
Holman's  Range  is  the  natural  link  between  civilization 
and  the  wilder  life  of  the  mountains.  A  portion  of  it  is 
filled  with  winding  paths  made  by  cows,  berry  pickers, 
grouse  shooters,  and  picnic  parties.  An  old  abandoned 
road  runs  through  one  part  of  it,  which,  though  now 
unused  by  wheeled  vehicles,  is  much  favored  by  eques 
trians.  It  has  grown  up  to  the  most  beautiful  form  of 
wild  garden.  Many  of  the  oaks  and  nut-trees,  having 
room  to  spread  their  boughs,  have  attained  to  large  size. 
The  old  roadbed  is  clothed  with  fine  grass  and  golden 
moss,  as  soft  as  velvet  to  the  foot-fall.  The  rarest  spring- 
flowers  are  found  along  this  path  that  coquets  equally 
with  sun  and  shade.  It  is  spiced  all  through  with  the 
trailing  arbutus  in  May,  and  later  come  the  columbine, 
the  laurel,  the  lady-slipper,  and  fox-glove,  and  in  early 
autumn  a  splendid  array  of  the  golden-rod,  and  bright 
cornel  berry,  the  mountain-ash,  and  brilliant  colored 
leaves. 

Many  years  ago  this  old  road  through  Holman's  Range 
had  one  inhabitant.  To-day  it  has  not  one.  The  ruinous 
house  of  this  solitary  resident  is  still  seen  there  thickly 
surrounded  with  bushes  and  the  vigorous  saplings  of  the 
elm,  maple,  and  chestnut.  The  roof  has  fallen,  and  the 


A    MYTHICAL   CHARACTER.  333 

wall  of  logs  has  partly  broken  down.  The  stone  chimney 
still  rises  in  the  middle  of  the  house,  but  it  is  like  the 
altar  of  a  forgotten  god  that  has  long  ceased  to  smoke. 
A  beautiful  spring  gushes  up  near  the  cabin  and  flows 
through  a  broken  conduit.  In  what  was  once  a  scrap  of 
door-yard,  walled  in  with  rude  stones,  two  or  three 
stunted  apple  trees  struggle  through  the  wilder  growths 
and  continue  to  blossom  when  May  comes  round,  obedient 
to  the  law  of  their  being. 

Many  years  ago  a  lone  man  lived  in  the  log-cabin.  If 
you  happened  then  to  stray  down  the  wood-road  you 
would  see  his  scant  linen  fluttering  on  the  line  which  he 
had  washed  and  hung  out  to  dry,  while  the  smoke  from 
his  rude  stone  chimney  curled  softly  up  among  the  boughs 
of  a  great  white  pine  that  shaded  the  roof  of  his  dwelling. 
This  man's  story  while  he  lived  here,  though  quiet  and 
entirely  uneventful,  had  something  pathetic,  even  tragic, 
in  its  implications.  As  absolutely  nothing  was  known  of 
his  early  history,  he  soon  became  a  mythical  character, 
and  many  of  the  myths  created  in  his  lifetime  have 
gathered  sharper  outlines  and  more  definite  details  since 
his  death.  His  career,  so  far  as  we  know,  is  but  a  leaf 
torn  out  of  the  book  of  his  life — a  tale  without  a  begin 
ning,  a  mystery  never  unraveled.  It  is  now  too  late  to 
hope  it  ever  will  be. 

Once  upon  a  time,  as  the  children's  story-books  say,  a 
stranger,  well  clad  and  with  the  air  of  an  educated  man — 
a  gentleman  who  had  lived  much  in  the  world  and  knew 
its  ways — presented  himself  to  an  aged  clergyman  in  the 
large  town  nearest  the  village.  He  had  come  in  on  the 
stage  one  dark  night  from  Hillsford.  He  at  once  pro 
ceeded  to  the  parsonage  and  requested  a  private  inter 
view  with  the  clergyman.  This  was  readily  granted,  and 
was  held  with  locked  doors.  It  happened  to  be  a  stormy, 
windy,  blustering  night,  and  the  interview  lasted  so  long 
that  Miss  Mercy,  the  clergyman's  daughter,  went  and 


334  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

spoke  to  her  father  through  the  door.  He  simply  replied 
by  requesting  her  to  go  away.  At  midnight  he  let  the 
stranger  out  of  the  front  door  and  carefully  closed  the 
house.  No  one  ever  knew  what  passed  between  the  two 
men  in  those  long  hours.  It  was  always  believed,  how 
ever,  that  the  stranger  had  confessed  some  hideous  crime, 
committed  perhaps  in  a  foreign  land  from  which  he  had 
fled,  and  had  asked  help  and  protection  from  the  old 
minister.  On  this  point  it  was  useless  to  try  and  interro 
gate  the  clergyman.  When  the  name  of  Styles  Garth 
was  mentioned  he  looked  blank,  and  declared  he  knew 
no  such  man.  But  Garth,  as  he  was  called,  did  appear 
among  us  bearing  a  line  to  Mrs.  Abby  Hastings  in  our 
village.  It  was  literally  a  line,  for  it  only  contained  the 
name  and  address  of  Mrs.  Hastings  in  the  old  clergy 
man's  handwriting.  Mrs.  Hastings  cherished  that  scrap 
of  paper  for  years,  but  she  could  never  make  any  thing 
more  out  of  it  than  was  patent  on  its  face. 

Mrs  Hastings  was  an  acquaintance  of  the  clergyman, 
a  widow  with  three  small  children  and  an  aged  mother, 
to  maintain  by  her  own  efforts.  She  worked  at  dress 
making,  fine  shirt  making,  went  out  occasionally  to  nurse 
the  sick,  and  took  in  boarders  and  lodgers  when  they 
offered,  which  was  but  seldom  in  those  days.  The 
stranger  entered  the  village  in  an  unassuming  manner, 
v/ith  a  little  square  trunk  having  a  strong  handle  in  the 
middle,  and  no  other  luggage.  He  carried  the  trunk 
himself  and  had  walked  all  the  way  from  the  county 
town,  bearing  it  in  his  hand.  He  presented  the  minister's 
line  to  Abby  Hastings  and  asked  for  a  lodging,  and  she 
promptly  gave  him  the  best  room  in  her  house,  which, 
barring  the  noise  of  the  children,  was  a  goodly  room,  with 
an  old-fashioned  fire-place,  and  an  alcoved  bed  divided 
off  by  chintz  curtains.  The  stranger  asked  for  meals  in 
his  own  apartment,  and  promised  to  pay  a  small  stipend 
in  addition  to  the  regular  board  for  the  privilege  of 


A    GREAT   TALKER.  335 

taking  them  alone.  Mrs.  Hastings  granted  the  request, 
not  very  willingly,  to  be  sure,  for  from  the  moment  of 
his  arrival  at  her  door,  with  the  little  square  trunk  in  his 
hand,  he  excited  her  itching  curiosity.  Abby  was  the 
greatest  talker  in  the  village,  and  had  the  Yankee  genius 
for  asking  questions  in  excess.  She  was  not  slow  in 
plying  her  new  boarder  with  queries  as  to  where  he  came 
from,  what  was  the  object  of  his  visit  to  the  village,  was 
he  a  married  man  or  a  bachelor,  and  how  long  did  he 
intend  to  tarry. 

But  for  once  Mrs  Abby  had  met  her  match.  He  made 
no  pretense  of  being  deaf,  and  he  certainly  was  not 
dumb,  but  he  parried  all  her  attacks  with  stolid,  imper 
turbable  silence,  even  turning  his  back  to  her  and  drum 
ming  on  the  window-pane,  until  at  last  she  refused  to 
speak  to  him  except  when  it  was  absolutely  necessary, 
and  a  kind  of  sign  language  grew  up  between  them 
which  was  but  sparsely  supplemented  by  uttered  words. 
The  stranger  had  a  slight  accent  which  might  have  been 
foreign  or  might  have  been  acquired  by  an  American  by 
long  residence  in  foreign  parts.  His  voice  was  singularly 
mellifluous  and  agreeable  to  the  ear.  After  he  had 
assumed  the  garb  of  a  poor  countryman  and  allowed  his 
beard  to  grow  you  would  have  known  he  was  a  cultivated 
man  by  that  delightful  voice,  had  it  been  your  privilege  to 
hear  him  speak.  The  stranger  had  given  his  name  as 
Styles  Garth,  of  nowhere  in  particular  ;  but  the  one  letter 
he  received  during  his  twelve  years'  residence  in  and  near 
the  village,  and  which  was  forwarded  by  a  New  York 
banker,  had  the  original  superscription  carefully  scratched 
out,  and  Styles  Garth,  Esq.,  and  the  village  address 
scrawled  in  the  only  unoccupied  portion  of  the  letter 
back,  which  was  covered  with  foreign  and  American 
postmarks  and  confused  scribblings.  The  postmaster 
and  Mistress  Hastings,  who  was  his  first  cousin,  spent  a 
whole  evening  scrutinizing  the  letter  before  they  delivered 


336  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

it  to  the  owner.  They  held  it  up  to  the  light,  examined 
the  seal,  and  picked  a  little  at  the  same  without  venturing 
to  break  it.  But  nothing  at  all  was  gleaned  from  this 
letter.  It  only  deepened  the  mystery  which  surrounded 
the  so-called  Styles  Garth. 

During  all  the  years  he  lived  in  the  country  he  ceased 
not  to  be  the  object  of  endless  curiosity  and  gossip,  and 
yet  he  was  by  no  means  a  marked  or  peculiar  man  in 
his  appearance,  and  his  manners  were  not  ungentle,  save 
that  at  times  he  shunned  all  intercourse  with  his  kind 
and  spent  whole  days  wandering  about  the  wildest  parts 
of  Holman's  Range.  Then  again  he  would  return  and 
mingle  with  the  men  of  the  village  with  a  kind  of  avidity, 
as  if  afraid  to  lose  the  use  and  wont  of  human  inter 
course,  and  to  forget  the  sound  of  his  own  voice.  A 
singular  charm  distinguished  these  moments  of  converse. 
Styles  Garth  was  evidently  a  man  who  had  traveled  far 
and  thought  deeply. 

He  was  learned  in  men  and  affairs  as  well  as  in 
books.  The  farmer,  the  mechanic,  even  the  drover 
and  teamster  on  the  road  could  learn  something  about 
his  own  trade  and  calling  from  this  man's  talk.  He 
conversed  only  with  men  and  children  ;  with  women 
he  held  absolutely  no  intercourse,  never  doing  more  than 
to  nod  to  the  old  dame  who  sat  knitting  in  the  house 
porch.  Soon  after  his  arrival  in  the  village  he  discarded 
his  more  fashionable  clothes,  having  had  himself  fitted  by 
a  country  tailor  and  shoemaker  with  the  garments  com 
mon  to  the  region.  He  donned  a  plain  hat,  and  with  a 
thick,  knotted  stick  in  his  hand^went  about  looking  like 
the  most  ordinary  farmer.  He  also  allowed  his  beard  to 
grow. 

But  these  changes  were  made  gradually,  and  it  could 
hardly  be  conjectured  that  he  had  made  them  for  the 
sake  of  disguising  himself.  It  was  apparent  he  had  put 
off  the  old  man.  His  past  was  absolutely  detached,  cut 


A    GRATUITOUS  ASSUMPTION.  337 

sheer  off  from  what  he  now  was.  Every  tie  was  sun 
dered,  every  association  left  behind.  He  had  no  lack  of 
money,  and  sometimes  paid  out  for  the  simple  neces 
sities  of  his  life  old  gold  coins  which  would  have  sold  to 
collectors  in  the  market  as  rarities.  I  hardly  know  how 
the  floating  conjectures  about  Garth's  past  came  to 
crystallize  into  the  singular  story  that  Garth  was  a 
wealthy  Englishman,  and  had  committed  a  murder  in 
his  own  country  ;  in  fact,  had  killed  his  wife  in  a  fit  of 
jealous  rage,  thrown  her  body  into  a  well,  and  then, 
seizing  such  valuables  as  he  had  on  hand,  had  fled  from 
the  land  under  a  disguised  name.  The  gratuitous 
assumption  of  the  murdered  wife  and  the  body  thrown 
into  the  well  was  really  amusing,  as  there  was  not  a  par 
ticle  of  evidence  whereon  to  build  it.  Still  people  felt 
justified  in  inventing  the  wildest  legen  rather  than  con 
fess  thay  knew  nothing  at  all  of  the  past  of  Styles  Garth. 

They  pointed  to  the  strange  conduct  of  the  Rev.  Peter 
Mifflin,  that  aged  divine  to  whom  Garth  had  first  betaken 
himself  on  his  arrival  in  the  country,  and  to  whom  he 
owed4hi?  introduction  to  the  village  and  to  the  house  of 
Mrs.  Abby  Hastings.  The  Rev.  Peter  was  a  man  much 
revered  for  sancity  and  purity  of  life  and  soundness  of 
doctrine.  All  his  family  connections  were  known.  His 
whole  career  was  open  to  the  daylight.  He  was  noted 
for  his  gentleness  and  urbanity,  and  that  persuasiveness 
by  which  he  lured  sinners  from  their  ways,  instead  of 
thundering  forth  the  terrors  of  the  law. 

Suddenly  the  old  man  drooped  and  sickened  under 
some  peculiar  malady  to  which  no  name  was  given,  and 
he  was  ordered  away  by  his  physician  on  a  vacation  jour 
ney  of  six  weeks.  It*  was  remembered  that  the  Rev. 
Peter's  illness  began  on  the  very  night  when  he  had  been 
closeted  for  several  hours  with  the  mysterious  stranger. 
But  change  of  air  and  scene  soon  restored  the  hale  old 
man  to  perfect  health.  When  any  thing  was  said  to  him 


338  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS, 

of  Styles  Garth  he  claimed  never  to  have  heard  the  name. 
When  he  drove  occasionally  to  the  village  in  his  chaise 
to  attend  ministers'  meeting,  or  exchange  with  the  local 
clergyman,  he  sometimes  met  the  stranger  face  to  face, 
but  no  glance  or  sign  of  recognition  ever  passed  between 
them. 

If  Garth  ever  heard  the  gossip  about  himself  with 
which  the  village  teemed,  he  was  perfectly  indifferent  to 
it.  At  Mrs.  Hastings'  he  lived  intrenched.  One  knock 
on  the  wall  of  his  room  with  his  thick  walking-stick  indi 
cated  a  desire  for  hot  water  to  be  left  at  his  door  ;  two 
sharp  raps  were  a  call  for  breakfast.  His  board  money 
he  left  wrapped  in  paper  on  his  table,  where  he  expected 
the  receipt  for  the  same  to  be  duly  deposited.  His  soiled 
linen  was  placed  in  the  eastern  corner  of  the  room,  and 
returned  mended  and  darned  on  a  certain  day  in  each 
week.  As  Mrs.  Abby  expressed  it,  she  had  never 
"  mended,  washed,  and  fed  such  another  boarder." 

This  stranger  had  put  a  curb  into  the  mouth  of  the  most 
inveterate  talker  the  town  had  ever  produced.  Only  one 
peculiar  fact  was  noted  in  regard  to  Styles  Garth,  and 
this  was  gleaned  after  long  and  careful  observation.  He 
was  literally  afraid  of  his  own  shadow.  Of  this  there 
came  not  to  be  the  slightest  doubt.  When  the  sun  was 
east  he  would  never  walk  west,  so  that  his  shadow  was 
east  before  him.  When  it  was  in  the  west  he  never  would 
turn  his  footsteps  eastward.  If  he  caught  sight  of  his 
shadow  by  chance  on  the  road  he  stood  transfixed  with 
an  unspeakable  dread.  Superstitious  people  declared 
that  the  shadow  itself  was  of  a  sinister  and  menacing 
form — elongated  beyond  all  proper  shadow  limits,  bicker 
ing,  mocking,  and  mowing  in  pantomime,  and  taking 
on  queer  shapes  to  the  developing  of  a  demon's  hoofs 
and  tail. 

But  all  this  was  the  veriest  nonsense.  Garth's  shadow 
was  perfectly  normal,  fantastic  to  be  sure,  as  all  shadows 


AFRAID   OF  HIS  SHADOW.  339 

are,  but  entirely  without  significance  to  an  observer. 
Why  his  face  blanched  and  his  eyes  changed  to  an  ex 
pression  of  helpless  terror  when  he  caught  sight  of  his 
own  spindled  legs  and  distorted  figure  moving  before 
him  gave  rise  to  the  wildest  conjectures.  Rivington  was 
then  a  young  medical  man  just  settled  in  the  village. 
With  the  sckpticism  of  his  class,  he  pooh-poohed  the 
absurd  stories  about  Styles  Garth's  being  haunted  by  his 
shadow.  In  his  opinion  he  was  a  monomaniac  on  some 
one  point,  and  otherwise  quite  rational.  He  had  proba 
bly  wandered  away  from  home,  said  the  doctor,  under 
some  mild  form  of  mental  aberration,  and  was  in  fact  one 
of  those  mysterious  disappearances  of  which  we  so  often 
read.  Two  or  three  years  after  Garth  came  to  the  vil 
lage  the  railroad  was  built  through  the  valley.  This  new 
road  seemed  to  terrify  Garth,  while  it  attracted  his  foot 
steps.  He  would  walk  along  the  track  for  miles  and 
miles,  with  his  head  bent,  tapping  the  rails  with  his  stick 
and  listening  intently  to  their  ring.  He  would  pass  from 
side  to  side  in  a  long  zigzag,  as  if  trying  to  evade  some 
thing  invisible  to  all  eyes  but  his  own.  But  after  the 
trains  began  running  he  never  went  near  it  again,  except 
at  night,  when  he  would  sometimes  follow  the  line  as 
far  as  Upton,  fifteen  miles  away. 

It  was  after  this  that  Garth  hired  the  log-cabin  built 
in  the  woods,  on  the  old  abandoned  road,  and  took  his 
permanent  leave  of  the  lodging  of  Mrs.  Hastings.  It  was 
reported  that  he  had  gone  to  live  in  the  woods  because 
his  shadow  troubled  him  less  in  a  place  where  the  sun 
shone  but  fitfully.  Was  it  the  memory  of  a  crime,  of 
disappointed  ambition,  of  a  cross  in  love,  or  was  it  some 
fearful  vision  of  a  diseased  brain  which  this  strange  man 
was  trying  to  elude  ?  No  one  was  ever  afraid  of  Garth 
who  came  in  contact  with  him.  He  did  many  helpful,  kind 
acts  about  the  country,  saving  the  farmers'  cattle  from 
pound,  curing  their  diseases,  and  prescribing  skillfully  for 


34°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

all  the  complaints  of  horses.  He  never  would  take  a  penny 
for  any  service.  Once  or  twice  he  had  carried  a  sick  farm 
hand  into  his  cabin  and  nursed  him  through  the  typhus 
fever.  He  doctored  these  people  on  a  principle  of  his 
own,  giving  no  medicine,  but  attending  strictly  to  clean 
liness,  bathing,  ventilation,  and  a  simple  and  abundant 
diet.  This  he  did  when  stifling  and  starving  was  con 
sidered  the  proper  treatment  for  fevers  ;  when  people 
were  fed  on  blue  pills  for  slight  ailments,  and  when  they 
took  a  course  of  strong  medicine  and  emetics  in  the 
spring  as  regularly  as  they  cleaned  house. 

When  the  village  people  came  to  spy  out  the  land  they 
found  absolutely  nothing  to  satisfy  their  morbid  curiosity. 
His  cabin  door  stood  open  day  and  night,  and  birds  and 
squirrels  entered  freely.  He  kept  a  drinking  vessel  at 
the  spring  for  those  who  wished  to  taste  its  pure,  cool 
water,  and  a  bench  under  the  pine  was  free  to  all.  It 
was  known  that  such  money  as  he  possessed  was  depos 
ited  in  the  county  bank.  There  was  nothing  worth  steal 
ing  in  his  cabin.  The  wife  of  a  poor  man  in  the  nearest 
clearing  did  his  baking,  and  he  lived  mainly  on  milk  and 
berries  in  summer. 

One  day  a  curly-pated  lad  of  five  or  six  ran  away 
from  his  home  in  the  village  and  got  lost  in  the 
great  wooded  tract  of  Hinman's  Range.  The  neigh 
bors  turned  out  in  a  large  searching  party.  The  poor 
mother  wrung  her  hands  and  wept  in  extreme  anguish 
of  soul.  She  had  buried  four  children,  and  this  boy 
was  the  only  one  left  to  her.  At  that  time  it  was 
believed  that  bears  and  catamounts  roamed  at  large 
in  the  wilder  parts  of  the  woods.  The  little  lad's  foot 
steps  were  traced  to  a  pond  which  lies  deep  hidden  in  the 
very  heart  of  the  range,  and  there  they  disappeared. 
He  had  stopped  to  build  small  play-houses  with  stones 
and  bushes  in  the  path,  and  by  these  he  was  tracked  to 
the  pond,  and  then  the  pathetic  little  tokens  ceased,  and 


THE  LOST  BOY.  34* 

the  footprints  last  seen  went  wandering  about  the 
shore. 

They  were  talking  of  dragging  the  pond  for  the  child's 
body  on  the  second  day  of  the  search,  when  Styles 
Garth  suddenly  appeared  in  the  village  bearing  the  little 
lost  boy  in  his  arms.  He  had  found  him  in  the  wildest, 
most  desolate  part  of  the  forest,  at  a  place  known  as 
Rattlesnake  Ledge,  where  the  little  fellow  was  plucking 
blackberries  for  his  breakfast  with  the  homesick  tears 
dripping  down  his  cheeks.  He  was  scratched  and  torn, 
dirty  and  disheveled,  but  otherwise  unharmed.  He  had 
slept  in  the  rattlesnakes'  den  on  a  great  bed  of  moss 
among  the  rocks,  but  nothing  had  hurt  the  boy.  He  was 
tired  of  his  long  wanderings  and  grieving  much  for  home, 
and  he  confided  himself  to  Garth's  care  with  childlike 
faith.  His  shoes  were  all  worn  out  and  his  feet  had  been 
cut  on  the  sharp  stones,  and  Garth  soon  took  him  in  his 
arms  and  brought  him,  a  heavy  boy,  nearly  five  miles  to 
his  home.  The  mother's  heart  overflowed  with  gratitude 
to  this  strange  man  for  the  rescue  of  her  child.  But  he 
would  not  listen  to  any  demonstrations.  He  deposited 
the  boy  in  her  arms  and  escaped  as  quickly  as  possible 
to  the  forest. 

This  incident  made  an  era  in  the  hermit's  life.  An 
unexplained  tie  of  interest  and  affection  bound  him  to 
the  boy  he  had  found  in  the  woods.  It  was  the  first 
humanizing  sentiment  that  had  fallen  on  his  heart  since 
he  appeared  in  the  village.  He  sometimes  came  about 
to  seek  the  boy,  and  as  he  grew  older  he  spent  whole  clays 
with  Styles  Garth  in  the  woods,  who  gave  him  his  first 
lessons  in  the  knowledge  of  plants  and  animals,  and  the 
wonders  of  nature,  and  laid  the  foundations  of  a  scien 
tific  curiosity  in  the  boy's  mind  that  ultimately  shaped  his 
career. 

The  mother,  though  she  was  afraid  of  Styles  Garth, 
could  not  keep  the  child  away  from  him  wholly,  and 


342  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

when  she  found  that  he  taught  the  child  nothing  evil, 
but  awoke  and  stimulated  all  the  powers  of  his  intellect, 
she  allowed  the  intimacy  to  go  on.  Fanciful  people 
invented  the  story  that  when  Ben  Hoadly  was  with 
Styles  Garth  he  was  not  afraid  of  his  shadow,  the  inno 
cent  nature  of  the  boy  acting  as  a  shield  against  those 
dark  and  mysterious  influences  that  at  times  seemed  to 
haunt  his  life. 

Ben  was  fifteen  wrhen  Styles  Garth  died.  He  had 
taken  a  severe  cold  while  on  a  visit  to  a  sick  laborer  on 
a  winter  day.  Our  doctor  attended  him  in  his  last  hours, 
and  Ben  Hoadly  was  with  him  and  held  him  in  his  arms 
when  he  died,  carrying  his  secret  down  to  the  grave. 
When  the  small  hand-trunk  was  examined  which  Garth 
had  brought  with  him  to  the  village  it  was  found  to  con 
tain  only  a  few  pieces  of  money,  sufficient  to  defray  the 
expenses  of  his  simple  funeral.  The  Rev.  Peter  Mifflin 
died  a  few  months  later,  at  the  age  of  eighty-five,  but  he 
left  no  scrap  of  writing,  nothing  to  indicate  the  nature  of 
the  secret  which  had  been  confided  to  him  by  Styles 
Garth.  The  curiosity-mongers  were  foiled  all  round, 
but  they  had  so  often  told  the  story  of  the  murdered 
wife,  and  the  deposit  of  her  body  in  the  well,  with  full 
and  minute  particulars,  that  in  the  end  they  came  firmly 
to  believe  it. 

Years  and  years  after  the  death  of  Styles  Garth,  Ben 
Hoadly,  the  only  being  who  had  ever  loved  him  in  the 
village,  erected  a  plain  stone  at  the  head  of  his  grave  on 
Burying-Ground  Hill,  and  inscribed  it  with  the  words, 
"To  My  Earliest  Friend."  The  superstitions  which 
attached  themselves  to  Garth  during  his  life  have  in  some 
strange  way  been  transferred  to  this  stone.  It  is  said 
that  at  times  it  casts  queer  shadows,  quite  abnormal  and 
inexplicable,  on  any  known  principle  attaching  to  face 
tious  tombstones.  But  you  may  safely  set  this  down 
among  the  number  of  village  myths. 


CHAPTER  XXXVI. 

JOHN    DEAN    AND    ORIANA. 

polite  and  refined  ladies  who  belong  to  the  best 
1  village  set  would  be  shocked  to  have  it  said  that 
they  are  given  to  tattle.  Their  mode  is  only  an  extension 
of  the  circulatory  and  respiratory  and  nervous  systems  of 
the  body  by  which  each  becomes  a  member  of  all,  and 
news  is  communicated  one  knows  not  how — perhaps  by 
touch  or  some  other  sense  perception.  The  best  village 
ladies  have  a  wholesome  horror  of  backbiting.  It  is  not 
only  scandalous,  it  is  vulgar.  It  has  been  so  much 
preached  against  and  moralized  over  that  the  spinsters, 
whoso  special  function  gossip  is  supposed  to  be,  are  very 
careful  how  they  "talk."  It  is  only  about  twenty  years 
ago  that  one  of  the  most  inveterate  old-maid  tattlers  and 
gossips  ever  known  here  was  publicly  expelled  from  a 
benevolent  society  and  reproved  in  the  weekly  prayer  and 
experience  meeting. 

Such  a  thing  could  not  happen  now.  If  there  is  an 
occasional  survival  of  the  unfittest  in  the  form  of  an 
old-fashioned  tattler,  who  makes  trouble  by  the  too  free 
use  of  her  tongue,  you  may  be  sure  she  does  not  belong 
to  the  best  set.  In  that  circle  there  is  intercommunion  of 
thought  and  feeling,  a  subtle  magnetism  which  puts  every 
body  en  rapport.  If  the  ladies  get  together  and  talk 
over  neighborhood  affairs  in  rather  too  free  a  spirit,  with 
an  occasional  verging  toward  something  which  might  by 
an  uninitiated  and  blundering  outsider  be  called  tittle- 
tattle,  some  one  is  sure  to  remark  that  this  class  of  talk 
comes  under  the  head  of  social  criticism.  Of  course,  she 


344  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

says,  persons  who  discriminate  at  all,  must  see  things  in 
their  friends  and  neighbors — little  peculiarities  and  foi 
bles  which  it  is  not  treasonable  to  mention  in  a  kindly 
way.  The  people  who  praise  every  body  indiscriminately, 
those  unmitigated  optimists  who  do  not  know  that  the 
kettle  is  black,  but  call  it  a  fine  shade  of  brown  or  gray, 
are  insipid  creatures  with  no  niceness  of  perception,  and 
therefore,  owing  to  their  universal  benevolence  and 
mushy  good  nature,  not  in  the  least  interesting. 

In  the  best  set  a  wholesome  equality  is  cultivated.  It 
is  not  considered  in  good  taste  for  some  people  to  dress 
more  expensively  or  wear  finer  jewels  than  others  can 
afford.  Mrs.  Judge  Magnus,  who  is  a  woman  of  great 
tact,  always  puts  away  her  diamonds  and  her  best  gowns 
when  she  comes  home  from  Washington.  She  wishes 
frankly  to  resume  her  place  in  the  village  sphere  she  so 
much  enjoys,  and  to  incur  the  least  possible  amount  of 
social  criticism.  The  judge  himself  always  tries  to  come 
down  a  few  pegs  on  his  return,  and  to  play  the  equality 
business  with  a  wholly  unconscious  air  ;  but  the  knowl 
edge  that  he  is  the  great  man  of  the  town — in  other 
words,  the  biggest  toad  in  the  puddle — causes  him  in 
time  unconsciously  to  ignore  his  forced  humility  and  to 
put  on  his  natural  expression  of  owning  the  village,  and, 
indeed,  the  county. 

The  judge  is  not  gifted  with  penetration,  but  his  wife 
has  enough  for  two.  She  knows  how  to  enter  into  all 
the  angles  and  sinuosities  and  crooks  of  village  life,  and 
to  make  herself  thoroughly  popular.  So  that,  although 
the  judge  imagines  himself  endowed  with  headship  and 
swells  around  mightily  in  consequence,  his  wife  never 
swells,  never  boasts,  never  assumes  any  thing  or  puts  on 
airs,  steps  about  in  her  neat,  plain  tailor  suit,  with  her 
keen  eye  out,  and  when  the  moment  is  ripe  seizes  any 
advantage  she  covets. 

"  A  fine  woman,"  says  Jake  Small,  spreading  himself, 


A    VIBRATORY  CENTER.  345 

"  and  the  best  of  the  team  by  a  long  shot.  If  gumption 
and  sense  could  get  the  gore  out  of  me,  she  could,  but 
it  ain't  to  be  did."  At  that  very  moment  Mrs.  Magnus 
was  sending  provisions  and  necessaries  to  Jake's  wife, 
who  had  just  added  her  eighth  to  the  illustrious  family 
of  Small. 

The  judge's  house  was  not  the  center  of  our  best  set. 
It  would  have  been  inconvenient,  for  she  often  entertained 
distinguished  strangers  from  a  distance,  at  which  times 
the  village  intimacies  would  have  clashed.  She  was  an 
adept  in  knowing  how  to  keep  people  in  the  right  place, 
to  placate  them,  cherish  them  in  good-humor,  and  make 
them  useful  on  occasion.  The  house  where  all  the  social 
telephone  wires  came  together  was  John  Dean's.  Mrs. 
Dean's  parlor  was  the  great  vibratory  center,  where  was 
gathered  and  distributed  the  peculiar  village  life  of  which 
I  have  spoken.  It  was  a  very  pretty  parlor,  for  Mrs. 
Dean  had  brought  a  nice  snug  fortune  to  her  husband, 
and  if  he  had  no  other  virtue  he  possessed  fine  taste  irL 
works  of  art.  The  charm  of  the  house  was  not  in 
upholstery,  but  in  rare  etchings  and  beautiful  editions  of 
old  books,  and  in  a  case  of  replicas  of  some  of  the  finest 
engraved  gems  in  the  world.  Mrs.  Dean  had  early  set 
her  face  against  Eastlake  and  all  the  tide  of  cheap  art 
decoration  that  came  in  with  him,  therefore  her  house 
had  a  distinct  character  of  its  own. 

It  was  known  that  Mrs.  Dean  had  consented  to  become 
the  center  of  the  best  set  in  order  to  find  some  little 
relief  from  John  Dean — as  her  sister,  Oriana  Freeborn, 
said,  "  some  outside  life  "  was  indispensable  to  poor  Els- 
peth.  John  Dean  was  jealous  of  feminine  influence  in 
his  home,  but  the  women  of  the  village  despised  his 
selfishness,  and  had  conspired  to  give  his  wife  the  change 
she  needed.  Their  influence  was  as  pervasive  as  the 
wind,  and  in  time  John  Dean  ceased  to  resist  it,  and  set 
tled  down  in  a  state  of  armed  neutrality.  Mr,  Dean 


346  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

was  a  cultivated  man,  with  a  perfect  appreciation  of  the 
art  treasures  he  had  collected  with  his  wife's  money.  He 
was  too  cultivated.  A  book-worm  from  his  earliest  years 
every  thing  he  had  ever  learned  in  the  line  of  his  favorite 
study,  the  philosophy  of  history,  stuck  to  him  like  beg 
gars'  lice  in  the  field.  He  could  not  rub  off  a  single  fact 
or  date,  nor  for  the  life  of  him  get  rid  of  any  of  that  tre 
mendous  store  of  information  that  made  his  specific  gra 
vity  so  overpowering.  It  was  not  the  philosophy  of 
history  alone  that  engrossed  him.  He  had  views  and 
theories  on  all  subjects,  which  he  poured  out  in  a  contin 
uous,  slow,  sluggish  stream  that  resembled  very  thick 
treacle. 

John  Dean  had  tried  to  write,  indeed,  had  written 
books  ;  but  the  firm  that  published  them  broke  down 
from  their  weight,  and  the  very  truck  which  conveyed 
them  from  place  to  place  was  hopelessly  wrecked  in  the 
street.  He  obtained  a  professorship  in  a  small  college 
because  of  his  vast  learning,  but  one  by  one  the  boys 
'  slunk  out  of  the  lecture-room,  and  he  was  left  slowly 
gesticulating  to  the  empty  benches.  He  had  tried  plat 
form  lecturing  with  the  same  result,  and  now  he  was 
reduced  to  the  home  audience. 

No  one  of  her  friends  could  understand  why  Miss 
Freeborn,  with  all  her  advantages  of  fortune,  good 
looks,  and  general  agreeableness,  had  ever  consented 
to  marry  John  Dean.  Her  sister  Oriana  says  it  was 
because  she  was  in  Europe  that  year,  and  Elspeth 
was  not  very  well,  and  was  crushed  by  John  Dean's 
elephantine  advances  and  the  statistics  of  the  Roman 
Empire  until  she  had  no  will  of  her  own.  Every 
body  pities  Mrs.  Dean,  but  being  a  heroic  little  woman 
she  never  complains.  The  terrible  fact  of  the  busi 
ness  is  that  John  Dean  is  always  at  home.  There  is 
no  escape  from  him  save  in  that  community  of  feeling 
which  pervades  the  best  set  ;  and  therefore  Mrs.  Dean 


A     WIFE'S  MIND.  347 

has  given  herself  up  more  to  the  trivialities  of  village  life 
than  her  taste  inclined.  The  public  having  decamped 
from  John  Dean,  and  his  books  having  fallen  like  lead 
into  the  bottomless  sea  of  oblivion,  there  is  nothing  left 
to  him  but  to  tutor  his  wife.  They  have  two  boys,  and 
Mrs.  Dean  is  rejoiced  to  see  that  they  both  take  after 
her  family.  The  Freeborns  are  jocular;  lively,  sensitive 
people,  with  a  certain  amount  of  indirection  and  subtlety 
in  their  fun.  John  Dean  has  never  in  the  whole  course 
of  his  life  been  able  to  comprehend  a  joke,  and  his  wife 
finds  no  relief  in  exercising  upon  him  her  natural  weap 
ons  of  irony  and  sarcasm.  She  is  obliged  to  sit  and 
receive  the  leaden  shower  of  instruction,  while  with  the 
rotary  motion  of  his  thick  finger  he  seems  to  bore  into 
her  mind  like  a  gimlet.  John  Dean  goes  upon  the  prin 
ciple  that  a  wife's  mind  is  or  ought  to  be  entirely  emptied 
of  its  contents,  into  which  it  is  the  duty  of  the  husband 
to  pour  his  accumulated  facts.  He  assumes  that  she 
knows  nothing,  never  has  learned  any  thing,  and  that  it 
is  absolutely  necessary  to  start  with  first  principles. 

Mrs.  Dean's  mind  is  by  no  means  an  exhausted  receiver. 
She  is  a  lively,  independent  personality.  To  be  sure  she 
has  been  much  crushed  by  Dean's  accumulations  of 
knowledge,  all  of  which  he  tries  upon  her  with  the  heavy 
theories  he  has  formulated  before  using  it  in  other  shape. 
But  since  she  became  the  recognized  center  of  the  best 
set  it  is  remarked  that  she  is  much  livelier,  poor  thing, 
and  more  herself.  In  her  parlor  it  has  been  decided 
that  Mrs.  Worldly  Wiseman  dresses  too  much  even  for  a 
bride,  and  all  the  peculiarities  of  Drusilla  and  the  Rev. 
Arthur  Meeker  have  been  discussed  in  the  spirit  of  an 
enlightened  social  criticism. 

Mrs.  Dean  looks  with  amused  sympathy  upon  the 
Rev.  Arthur,  who  is  certainly  growing  a  little  stouter. 
Drusilla  has  ascertained  that  he  now  weighs  five 
pounds  and  eleven  ounces  more  than  he  did  at  the 


348  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

time  of  his  marriage.  But  it  can  not  be  said  that  his 
manly  spirit  has  yet  reared  its  head  in  resistance  to 
Drusilla's  tyranny.  A  funny  thing  in  connection  with 
the  Rev.  Arthur  is  that  St.  Patty  has  furtively  and  cau 
tiously  taken  his  side,  and  tries  in  her  own  sly  way  to  en 
courage  him  to  eat  things  upon  the  interdicted  list  of 
edibles.  But  as  yet  he  only  looks  frightened  when  she 
suggests  such  a  thing.  Mrs.  Dean  in  certain  moods  feels 
that  she  and  Arthur  Meeker  are  in  the  same  boat — victims 
of  matrimonial  oppression  of  a  kind  which  ordinarily  elicits 
but  little  sympathy.  It  may  be  that  she  will  yet  enter 
into  a  silent  conspiracy  with  St.  Patty  to  give  him  the 
needed  help  in  plucking  up  courage  to  throw  off  the 
yoke.  For  herself  she  sees  there  is  no  hope,  save  through 
those  little  loopholes  of  cheery  life  which  come  to  her 
from  without.  When  she  is  permitted  to  be  frivolous, 
she  feels  quite  happy  and  almost  young.  She  must  bear 
her  heavy  fate  as  best  she  can  and  try  to  live  for  her  boys, 
in  whom  she  will  do  her  best  to  instill  a  proper  hatred  for 
the  philosophy  of  history  and  universal  knowledge.  She 
rather  hopes  they  may  take  to  athletics,  and  she  intends 
to  teach  them  early  that  a  wife  is  not  by  nature  to  be 
purely  passive  and  receptive,  in  other  words,  to  go  to 
school  to  her  husband  all  the  days  of  her  life,  without 
breaking  down  under  the  strain. 

But  Mrs.  Dean  is  much  subdued — infinitely  more  jaded 
and  spiritless  than  nature  intended  her  to  be.  Her  sister 
Oriana,  on  the  other  hand,  is  entirely  unsubdued.  John 
Dean  does  not  particularly  care  to  have  Oriana  make 
them  long  visits,  for,  strengthened  by  Oriana's  influence, 
his  wife  acquires  modes  of  thought  and  expression  and 
an  out-door  air  of  independence  which  considerably 
weaken  his  hold  upon  her  intellect.  He  thinks  that  if 
Oriana  had  come  early  under  his  formative  hand  she 
might  have  amounted  to  something,  and  probably  secured 
a  husband  for  her  own  private  instruction.  But  the  fact 


JOHN    TUTORS  ORIANA.  349 

is  there  was  nothing  Oriana  long  viewed  with  such  horror 
as  coming  under  the  bondage  of  matrimony.  The  sole 
reason  why  she  has  not  married  long  before  is  the  sad 
fate  of  her  sister  Elspeth.  John  Dean  being  a  perfectly 
reputable  man  with  no  redeeming  vices,  .Oriana,  the 
irreverent,  thinks  she  would  like  him  much  better  if  he 
had  done  something  rather  bad.  His  moral  scrupulosity 
is  quite  thrown  away  upon  her,  and  confirms  her  in  a 
saucy  mode  of  free  thinking  and  acting  particularly  ob 
noxious  to  her  brother-in-law.  There  is  nothing  which 
gives  her  such  exquisite  delight  as  to  shock  John 
Dean. 

Oriana  has  all  the  advantages  of  fortune  which  Elspeth 
possessed.  She  lives  with  an  aged  aunt  in  a  distant  city, 
and  when  she  comes  to  the  village  she  gives  it  distinction. 
Her  form  is  very  elegant  and  her  face  is  piquant  and 
sparkling.  She  has  an  abundance  of  golden-brown  hair  of 
the  loose,  fluffy,  wavy  kind,  and  however  she  tosses  it  up  it 
looks  only  the  more  lovely.  It  is  impossible  to  imitate 
her  style  of  dressing  or  behaving,  for  she  never  looks  or 
acts  twice  alike,  so  varied  are  her  moods  ;  but  all  have  a 
certain  brilliance.  Oriana  may  be  thirty  or  thirty-five, 
but  she  is  one  of  those  women  who  never  grow  old.  Age 
can  not  wither  nor  custom  change  her  infinite 
variety. 

When  she  is  visiting  in  the  village,  she  is  in  a  con 
stant  state  of  inward  irritation  with  John  Dean,  which, 
for  Elspeth's  sake,  she  tries  to  cover  with  bland  com 
placency.  When  she  is  a  member  of  his  household, 
John  feels  it  is  his  duty  to  tutor  Oriana,  and  his  efforts 
to  improve  her  mind  in  his  ponderous,  slow,  persistent 
way  nearly  set  her  wild.  It  is  extremely  trying  to  a  per 
son  of  Oriana's  disposition  to  have  it  taken  for  granted 
that  she  has  never  read  any  thing,  and  is  ignorant  of  the 
commonest  facts  of  experience,  while  all  the  time  that 
dreadful  finger  rotates  quite  near  her  face,  and  the  op- 


35°  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS, 

pressiveness  of  his  large,  stout  person  is  more  than  she 
can  bear. 

Oriana  gets  so  morbidly  sensitive  to  John's  presence 
she  hates  the  creak  of  his  chair,  the  way  he  twitches  his 
light  mustache  and  ruffles  his  leonine  locks,  the  rustle 
of  his  newspaper,  and  the  manner  he  clears  his  throat 
when  he  prepares  to  begin  to  instruct.  The  only  relief 
she  finds  is  in  saying  very  saucy  things  to  John  Dean, 
things  sufficiently  caustic  to  bite  into  his  thick  conscious 
ness  ;  and  when  John  is  aroused  he  retorts  with  a  heavy 
hand.  Dean  is  a  great  purist  about  words,  and  is  always 
taking  Oriana  up  as  to  the  meaning  and .  derivation  of 
the  terms  she  uses. 

One  afternoon  just  before  dark,  John  and  Oriana 
had  begun  by  fighting  over  some  little  insignificant 
word  of  four  letters,  which  he  claimed  she  did  not 
use  in  its  proper  connection.  They  had  begun  in  a 
light  vein,  as  light  as  John  was  capable  of,  but  soon  ran 
into  personalities,  and  began  telling  each  other  the  plain 
est  truths.  John  had  deprecated  the  influence  of  the 
volatile,  giddy  Oriana  on  the  mind  of  his  wife,  and  Oriana 
had  twitted  him  most  unhandsomely  with  living  on  his 
wife's  income  and  boring  her  to  death.  They  had  both 
been  very  outspoken,  and  poor  Oriana  was  more  vexed 
with  herself  even  than  she  was  with  John,  who  provokingly 
kept  his  temper  while  he  told  her  what  a  very  improper 
person  she  was,  and  set  forth  her  violence  and  irreverence 
for  her  betters  in  glaring  colors. 

Poor  distressed  Elspeth  could  do  nothing  to  sepa 
rate  them.  But  at  last  Oriana  seized  her  bonnet 
and  rushed  out  into  the  street.  She  was  too  indig 
nant  to  cry,  but  her  face  was  flushed  and  mottled 
with  the  excitement  of  the  battle.  As  soon  as  she 
was  alone  she  fell  into  a  state  of  abject  self-abasement 
for  the  words  she  had  used  to  John  Dean,  and  she  was 
so  ashamed  of  herself  that  she  sped  rapidly  along,  with 


COLLISION.  35 1 

her  head  down,  not  caring  to  see  any  thing  or  be 
seen. 

The  sun  was  low,  casting  beautiful  long  beams  the 
whole  length  of  the  leafy  arcade  of  Main  Street,  and  the 
tepid,  soft  wind  of  September  brought  down  the  pale 
colored  autumn  leaves,  and  heaped  them  in  drifts  along 
the  walk,  or  scattered  them  over  fences  and  into  the  ruts 
of  the  road,  covering  the  grass  with  bright  patches. 
The  trees  looked  higher  than  usual,  and  a  vague,  sweet, 
sad  sentiment  of  the  passing  away  of  summer  seemed  to 
linger  in  the  air.  Oriana  saw  nothing,  for  her  head  was 
down  and  her  cheeks  were  burning  ;  but  she  half  ran 
along  theValk  in  the  hope  of  getting  to  some  open  place 
beyond  the  town,  when  at  the  junction  of  Main  and  Mar 
ket  Streets  she  came  in  sharp  collision  with  some  one 
who  was  just  rounding  the  corner.  She  fell  back  a  step 
or  two  from  the  shock,  and  for  an  instant  could  not  dis 
tinguish  the  person  with  whom  she  had  collided.  But  it 
happened  to  be  the  young  man  named  Hugh,  the  village 
historian  and  briefless  lawyer,  who  boarded  with  Aunt 
Dido.  He  had  been -carrying  an  old  family  Bible  under 
his  arm  which  Mother  Vibard  had  lent  him  to  copy  some 
dates — an  old  book  worth  its  weight  in  gold.  But  the 
shock  of  meeting  Oriana  had  thrown  it  into  the  dust. 

"  Hullo,"  said  he,  picking  up  the  book  and  looking  at 
Oriana  curiously.  "  Whither  away  so  fast,  Miss  Freeborn, 
that  the  lives  of  innocent,  unprotected  young  men  are  en 
dangered  at  every  street  corner." 

Oriana,  brought  to  her  senses,  was  covered  with  con 
fusion.  She  knew  Hugh  very  well,  but  with  her  quick 
tongue  she  could  not  find  a  word  to  say  for  herself,  until 
at  last  she  did  manage  to  stammer  out :  "  I  believe  I  was 
running  away." 

"  From  whom,  pray  ? " 

"  Oh,  from  myself." 

"  Don't,"   said   Hugh   in  a  whimsically  gentle   voice. 


35 2  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

"  If  you  will  promise  not  to,  I  will  give  you  one  of  the 
arrow-heads  I  picked  up  this  afternoon  on  Hoddon  Hill, 
where  the  old  graves  are."  And  he  pulled  out  of  his 
pocket  a  queer  little  black  stone  almost  exactly  in  the 
shape  of  a  worn  heart.  Oriana  took  it  and  stood  looking 
at  it  in  the  path,  as  Hugh  went  on  whistling  softly  to  him 
self.  That  night  at  tea  Hugh  told  the  little  incident  to 
Aunt  Dido,  who  was  dressed  up  unusually  for  her,  as  she 
had  been  out  calling,  and  now  was  pouring  her  boarder  a 
second  cup. 

"  Hugh,"  said  she  meditatively,  through  the  steam  of 
the  teapot,  after  a  moment's  silence,  "  why  don't  you 
shine  up  to  Orianny  ?  " 


CHAPTER  XXXVII. 

HUGH    GETS    A    LADY    IN    HIS    EYE. 

HUGH  went  strolling  about  in  the  September  weather, 
with  his  hands  in  his  pockets,  whistling  softly  to 
himself.  He  generally  carried  an  old  book  or  a  review 
under  his  arm.  The  woods  were  at  their  finest,  just  be 
ginning  to  flicker  with  autumn's  fires,  although  the  great 
body  of  shade  was  still  green.  Hugh  did  not  seem  to 
care  much  for  companionship.  He  seldom  invited  the 
young  minister  to  walk  with  him  now,  nor  could  he  be 
found  in  his  accustomed  haunts  in  the  village  parlors, 
browsing  among  his  neighbors'  small  libraries,  or  spend 
ing  his  spare  time  with  his  favorite  old  ladies,  or  devot 
ing  himself  to  the  young  ones,  who  knew  him  so  well 
they  were  content  to  be  his  friends  without  ulterior  views, 
or  side-glances  toward  love-making. 

People  were  at  a  loss  to  know  where  Hugh  had  hidden 
himself.  His  local  history  was  now  complete,  and  was 
selling  well  by  subscription.  His  friends  advised  him  to 
devote  himself  to  some  new  and  larger  work  which  would 
furnish  a  respectable  field  for  his  talents  and  attain 
ments.  The  parson  had  strongly  urged  that  he  should 
write  a  book  on  the  history  and  poetry  of  the  great  world 
cathedrals,  an  undertaking  which  he  felt  would  be  pecu 
liarly  sympathetic  to  Hugh's  genius  ;  it  would  force  him 
to  shake  himself  together,  pick  up  the  loose  ends  of  his 
careless  life,  and  go  abroad  for  study.  He  would  thus 
get  out  of  the  deep  ruts  in  which  he  had  lived  so  long. 
But  Hugh  shrank  from  the  idea.  He  evidently  needed 
some  new  interest  in  his  life,  but  he  was  like  a  cat  in  the 


354  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

tenacity  of  his  close-clinging  local  affections.  The 
woods  and  fields  and  cow-lanes  and  byways  of  the  vil 
lage  had  grown  to  be  a  part  of  himself,  and  only  some 
fresh  and  overpowering  influence  could  detach  him  from 
the  trellis  where  he  clung  like  an  unpruned  vine. 

It  was  curious  the  number  of  people  who  believed  in 
the  possibilities  of  this  young  man,  and  busied  them 
selves  in  trying  to  find  the  exact  thing  he  was  good  for. 
And  as  the  years  glided  away,  they  entirely  forgot  that 
he  was  ceasing  to  be  so  very  young,  that  he  had  in  fact 
entered  upon  his  thirties.  But  the  interest  in  him  was 
perennial.  It  showed  a  certain  vein  of  genius  in  the  man 
that  he  could  thus  awaken  expectancy  and  keep  it  fresh. 
Mrs.  Deacon  Hildreth  and  the  little  sisters,  and  several 
others  thought  he  might  make  a  fine  preacher  if  he  only 
turned  his  attention  to  serious  things.  But  first  it  would 
be  necessary  to  convert  him,  which,  they  imagined, 
would  be  somewhat  like  dyeing  him  of  a  new  color. 
But  he  had  shown  no  tendency  toward  this  mystic  and 
wonderful  process.  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman  had  even  pro 
posed  to  him  to  become  a  village  real-estate  agent,  but 
Aunt  Dido  still  pinned  all  her  hopes  for  Hugh  on  his 
marriage  to  the  right  woman.  She  had  a  theory  of  her 
own,  which  she  could  not  put  into  words,  that  if  he  fell 
desperately  in  love,  it  would  bring  together  the  ele 
ments  of  his  character  until  they  combined  into  some 
thing  organic  and  noble. 

Hugh  felt  in  his  soul  that  the  celestial  fire  had  been 
but  scantily  dealt  out  to  him.  He  had  a  profound  sym 
pathy  with  nature,  and  yet  he  was  a  poet  only  in  feeling. 
He  loved  harmonies,  and  felt  their  deepest  meanings, 
and  yet  he  was  not  a  musician.  The  past  allured  him 
with  power  in  all  its  picturesque  aspects,  and  yet  he  could 
not  be  a  romancer.  He  was  infected  with  the  disease  of 
the  premature  youth  of  the  age — the  belief  that  no  form 
of  effort  is  very  much  worth  while  in  the  world  constituted 


A    SPECIAL   PEEP  AT  OR 1 'ANA.  355 

as  it  now  is.  If  he  felt  like  a  poet  and  a  musician,  he  was 
still  afraid  to  spoil  the  spring  of  his  enjoyment  by  ped 
dling  it  out  in  the  market-place.  Hugh  had  run  into  a 
great  many  imperfect  relations,  and  had  formed  but  a 
few  which  would  bear  any  serious  strain.  His  keen 
sense  of  humor  let  him  into  most  of  the  shams  of  life, 
and  yet  withal  there  was  a  kind  of  unspoiled  freshness 
about  his  nature,  like  the  odor  of  birch  bark  and  pine 
cones.  He  loved  to  observe,  and  he  thought  a  village  as 
good  a  field  of  observation  as  any.  The  very  ease  with 
which  he  met  all  classes  of  people,  joked  with  them,  and 
left  them  feeling  brighter  and  cheerier,  covered  the 
closely  guarded  center  of  his  own  life. 

Dr.  Holmes  says  that  a  man  must  get  sight  of  the 
woman  he  is  to  fall  in  love  with  through  a  pin-hole.  She 
is  just  like  other  beings,  but  he  must  get  a  special  peep 
at  her  in  a  moment  of  susceptibility,  and  then  she  fills 
his  eye  and  changes  his  life.  Hugh  took  this  special 
peep  at  Oriana  when  she  stood  there  in  the  low-glancing 
light  of  the  sun,  under  the  changing  trees,  agitated  and 
flushed,  with  her  eyes  gleaming  almost  as  if  ready  to 
shed  tears.  He  had  never  so  completely  taken  this 
peep  at  any  other  woman,  however  charming,  that  her 
weaknesses,  and  her  foibles,  or  affectations  had  not 
spoiled  the  impression.  But  since  he  had  given  the  lit 
tle  black  arrow-head,  shaped  like  a  heart,  to  Oriana,  it 
seemed  to  Hugh  that  he  was  in  love  with  some  idea  of 
her,  not  with  the  woman  herself.  And  it  took  a  long 
time  for  him  to  find  out  where  he  stood.  The  light  halo 
of  her  hair,  which  the  sun  shone  through  that  afternoon, 
was  always  before  him.  The  expression  of  her  face, 
with  the  half-shadow  of  some  trouble  upon  it,  seemed 
divine.  When  he  thought  of  meeting  her  again  in  the 
old,  easy,  familiar  way  he  was  covered  with  confusion. 
Where  was  his  well-established  impudence,  his  persiflage 
and  raillery  ?  Oriana  Freeborn  had  suddenly  become  a 


35 6  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS, 

mystery  to  him.  He  went  about  secretly  hoping  yet  dread 
ing  to  meet  her.  He  was  afraid  she  would  read  his  soul 
and  think  him  ridiculous. 

Hugh  emptied  his  mind  of  all  its  trash,  every  thing  he 
had  cared  about,  had  thought  or  read,  to  give  it  entirely 
to  this  new  guest.  In  a  certain  way  he  tried  to  purify 
that  inner  chamber,  to  make  it  meet  for  such  company 
by  humility  and  self-abasement.  It  was  not  Oriana,  it 
was  the  idea  of  her,  that  was  so  entrancing ;  and  of 
course  it  would  never  come  to  any  thing.  He  knew  he 
had  entered  on  a  new  and  beautiful  experience,  but  for  a 
long  time  he  did  not  know  that  he  was  in  love.  He  re 
visited  all  his  old  haunts  on  the  mountains,  in  the  woods, 
even  the  most  retired  places  by  Fisher  Brook  and  up  the 
Hilham  Gorge,  because  the  notion  came  to  him  that  if 
he  were  to  think  these  new  thoughts  about  Oriana  in  his 
favorite  places,  they  would  all  be  changed  and  forever 
associated  with  her  image. 

One  day  he  lay  under  some  tall  pines  on  a  knoll 
in  Holman's  Range.  It  was  a  very  retired  part  of 
the  woods,  and  he  seemed  to  be  buried  in  layer  upon 
layer  of  forest,  with  the  hills  rising  over  it  in  round 
heads,  or  in  long  wavy  blue  lines.  The  forest  was 
parti-colored,  melting  into  violet  and  azure  haze,  and 
tangling  the  autumn  colors  in  soft  bright  gauzy  webs  and 
veils.  As  he  sat  there  he  could  gaze  over  the  great  mo 
saic  for  miles  and  miles,  and  hear  nothing  but  the  rustle 
of  a  rabbit  or  squirrel  in  the  fallen  leaves,  or  the  cawing 
of  a  distant  crow,  save  the  wind  that  swept  with  a  long 
even  swing  over  the  forest  like  the  swaying  of  a  pendu 
lum — that  wind  of  autumn  which  brings  with  it  such 
multitudes  of  thoughts  and  memories  and  emotions.  As 
he  sat  there  at  the  foot  of  a  great  pine,  with  the  lights 
and  shades  flitting  over  him,  wondering  why  this  idea  of 
Oriana  had  taken  such  complete  possession  of  him,  the 
true  meaning  of  the  experience  flashed  on  his  mind.  He 


HE    WAS  IN  LOVE.  357 

was  in  love.  Hugh  took  his  head  between  his  hands,  and 
such  a  rush  of  blissful  feelings  came  over  him  I  am  not 
sure  his  eyes  were  not  suffused  with  tears.  He  had  felt 
so  long  he  could  never  have  this  experience  ;  now  it  had 
stolen  upon  him  unawares,  it  seemed  a  miracle  like 
prophecy  or  the  gift  of  tongues.  Some  glory  and  sweet 
ness  out  of  the  unknown  had  come  to  him  who  was  un 
worthy  of  such  a  visitation.  It  humbled  his  pride,  and 
made  him  feel  like  a  new  man.  And  yet  in  that  part  of 
his  intellect  not  quite  under  the  spell,  Hugh,  strange  as  it 
may  appear,  knew  even  at  that  moment  that  probably  he 
was  not  in  love  with  the  real  Oriana.  She  might  be  way 
ward,  perverse,  or  ill-tempered,  even.  But  it  made  no 
difference.  She  stood  there  in  a  gleam  of  sunlight  on 
the  pine  needles,  the  one  woman  in  the  world  for  him. 

Now  that  Hugh  had  found  out  what  ailed  him,  and  was 
very  sure  it  was  not  malaria  or  liver  complaint,  as  Aunt 
Dido,  seeing  his  pensiveness,  had  suggested,  he  wondered 
what  he  would  be  expected  to  do  next.  The  expectation 
was  of  course  confined  to  the  calmer  and  more  rational 
part  of  his  consciousness.  She  might  never  know  of  this 
experience,  which  in  his  state  of  exaltation  seemed  so  re 
generating  and  transforming.  He  might  never  dare  to 
tell  her.  He  had  known  her  a  year  or  two.  Why  had  he 
not  felt  this  toward  her  at  first  ?  It  was  all  a  mystery. 
Perhaps  it  was  a  species  of  intoxication,  like  opium-eating 
or  dram-drinking,  that  would  leave  him  with  a  headache 
and  a  bad  taste  in  his  mouth.  Hugh  felt  that  he  must 
take  some  time  to  find  out  what  was  expected  of  him  now 
that  he  was  in  love,  and  especially  as  the  lady  of  his  love 
was  profoundly  ignorant  of  the  fact  and  would  probably 
scorn  his  proposals  if  he  ever  ventured  to  make  any. 
This  new  virtue  of  humility  that  had  come  to  Hugh 
seemed  to  sit  rather  awkwardly  upon  him,  like  a  suit  of 
ill-fitting  clothes.  At  all  events  he  must  try  to  see 
Oriana.  As  he  disliked  John  Dean,  he  would  not  go  to 


358  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

the  house,  but  he  must  watch  and  wait  for  her  like  a  dog 
for  his  master's  footsteps. 

Oriana  had  been  staying  on  at  John  Dean's,  doing 
penance  for  her  sins.  She  was  trying,  for  Elspeth's  sake, 
to  be  very  polite  to  her  brother-in-law,  and  a  glacial  state 
of  courtesy  had  grown  up  between  them.  She  talked 
with  Elspeth  about  the  weather  at  table  because  Dean 
would  not  converse  in  her  presence  now  (he  never  talked), 
and  waited  until  he  should  emerge  from  the  sulks.  But 
he  tried  to  show  her  how  he  could  heap  coals  of  fire  on 
her  head  by  invariably  giving  her  the  tenderloin  portion 
of  the  beefsteak.  Had  it  not  been  for  the  two  boys  and 
their  boy-talk,  the  meals  would  have  been  unendurable. 
When  she  encouraged  them  to  chatter  too  loudly,  Elspeth, 
who  was  watching  her  husband's  face,  would  softly  press 
Oriana's  foot  with  her  own  under  the  table.  The  house 
was  uncomfortable,  and  Oriana  kept  as  much  on  the  out 
side  of  it  as  possible  in  those  beautiful  blue  September 
days.  Why  she  did  not  go  home  to  her  kind  old  aunt, 
who  was  constantly  writing  for  her  to  come,  was,  she  said 
to  herself,  because  her  penance  had  not  been  longer  hard 
enough. 

She  knew  well  that  Elspeth  would  be  more  comfortable 
when  left  to  herself.  Perhaps  her  imagination  had  been 
slightly  infected  by  the  trifling  incident  which  threw  her 
in  Hugh's  way.  She  had  always  liked  Hugh.  A  mag 
netic  touch  of  sympathy  seemed  to  flash  out  from  his 
laughing  eyes,  and  even  white  teeth  which  he  showed 
when  he  smiled.  She  fancied  he  understood  her  little 
caprices,  her  changeable  moods  and  varied  impulses 
which  made  her  original  and  unlike  any  body  else.  She 
often  looked  at  the  little  arrow  head  he  had  given  her. 
It  was  an  ugly  little  bit  of  flint,  worn  almost  like  a  pebble, 
but  she  prized  it  and  carried  it  about  in  her  pocket.  At 
night  she  had  once  or  twice  put  it  under  her  pillow  to 
dream  on.  But  the  idea  of  being  in  love  with  Hugh  was 


HER  PLAN  OF  SPINSTERHOOD.  359 

ridiculous.  She  gloried  in  the  plan  of  spinsterhood  and 
perfect  independence  she  had  formed,  seeing  that  hardly 
one  of  her  intimate  friends  had  married,  as  she  said, 
happily.  But  to  be  sure  her  ideas  of  marital  bliss  were 
rather  exacting.  She  abhorred  the  squabbles  and  bick 
erings,  the  fallings-out,  and  makings-up  attendant  on 
matrimony  as  she  had  witnessed  it  in  several  families,  and 
more  than  all  the  stupid,  commonplace,  material  life  into 
which  married  people  settle  when  they  have  become  thor 
oughly  accustomed  to  each  other  and  have  no  new  dis 
coveries  to  make  in  that  realm.  Oriana  was  so  pessimistic 
about  marriage,  she  had  always  said  if  she  ever  married 
she  would  have  to  be  captured  ;  but  she  did  own  to  her 
self  that  this  might  happen. 

Moreover,  she  had  vowed  never  to  marry  a  man  without 
a  settled  business  and  some  income  of  his  own.  Hugh 
had  neither,  and  was  therefore  out  of  the  question. 
Hugh  had  alsd  vowed  he  would  never  live  on  a  wife's 
means.  He  despised  John  Dean  for  looking  so  fat,  and 
sleek,  and  well-fed  on  Elspeth's  money.  He  loved  inde 
pendence  like  a  wild  bird  in  a  bush.  The  thought  had  at 
times  come  to  him  that  he  would  go  into  the  woods  and 
live  alone  a  year  or  two,  like  Thoreau,  to  find  out  what 
kind  of  creature  a  man  is  without  padding  and  appurte 
nances.  But  when  you  are  in  love,  all  is  changed. 

As  the  Dean  house  was  not  pleasant  for  Oriana,  she 
spent  most  of  her  waking  time  out  of  doors.  The  air  was 
crisp  and  delicious,  and  sent  the  blood  tingling  to  the 
extremities.  The  village  gardens  were  full  of  rich  fall 
flowers — salvias,  gladioli,  dahlias,  and  scarlet  geraniums. 
The  air  was  perfumed  with  ripening  fruit.  The  brown 
nuts  began  to  shake  down  from  the  trees.  Apples  lay  in 
heaps  on  the  ground.  Plums,  and  quinces,  and  grapes 
filled  the  air  with  a  delicate  honey  sweetness  when  it  blew 
in  puffs  from  the  south.  The  changing  leaves  added  to 
the  pervasive  sense  of  the  ripe  year  which  is  more  an 


360  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

influence  than  an  odor.  Oriana  breathed  it  as  she  glided 
lightly  along  toward  the  woods,  bearing  a  little  basket  in 
her  hand  to  hold  hazelnuts,  beech  drops,  the  Indian  pipe, 
colored  leaves,  and  above  all  the  blue  fringed  gentian, 
should  she  be  fortunate  enough  to  find  it.  She  also  car 
ried  a  small  black  satin  bag  on  her  arm,  which  con 
tained  a  sketch  book  and  a  tiny  volume  of  Michael 
Angelo's  sonnets. 

But  she  never  read,  nor  did  she  sketch.  She  went  to 
the  woods  to  dream  away  the  warm  noons,  when  the  sun 
brought  out  the  brilliancy  of  the  changing  year,  and  made 
it  drip  with  crimson  and  gold  dyes  as  the  leaves  slowly 
fluttered  down  in  grassy  spots  still  of  a  perfect  solid  green. 
One  day  Hugh  was  coming  home  from  a  tramp  along  the 
slopes  of  Saddleback,  by  way  of  Birch  Brook,  and  was 
just  striking  through  the  Cutter  place,  on  the  Roundabout 
Road,  when  in  a  little  open  ferny  covert,  not  far  from  the 
brook  and  about  a  hundred  rods  from  the  road,  he  came 
upon  Oriana  sitting  in  the  shade  of  a  wide- spreading 
chestnut  tree.  She  was  dressed  in  gray  and  had  put 
some  bright  leaves  in  the  bodice  of  her  gown.  He  had 
been  so  absorbed  in  the  thought  of  her  he  was  hardly 
surprised  to  see  her  there  before  him.  But  he  noticed 
that  she  was  slightly  pale,  and  her  lips  were  contracted  as 
if  in  pain. 

"  I  have  sprained  my  ankle,"  she  said,  as  she  turned 
her  head  at  the  sound  of  his  footsteps,  "  just  a  little,  you 
know,  by  stepping  into  a  treacherous  moss-covered  hole. 
How  lucky  it  is  you  have  come.  I  fear  I  can  not  rise 
without  help.  If  you  can  get  me  on  my  feet,  I  shall  be 
able,  perhaps,  to  hobble  home." 

Hugh  looked  at  her  timidly,  with  a  shyness  that  was 
entirely  new  to  him.  He  did  not  say  he  was  sorry  for  her 
accident,  for  he  was  too  much  absorbed,  and  the  con 
sciousness  of  all  he  felt  for  her  came  up  into  his  eyes, 
and  she  saw  it. 


HE  HELPED  HER  TO  HER  FEET.      36* 

He  helped  her  to  her  feet  and  she  tried  to  walk,  hold 
ing  his  arm  and  limping  badly  at  every  step.  He  saw  the 
pain  was  severe.  She  grew  pale  even  to  her  lips. 

"  Would  you  mind,"  said  he,  with  the  same  timid,  con 
scious  air,  "  if  I  were  to  put  my  arm  around  you  and  lift 
you  over  the  worst  places  ?  I  could  easily  carry  you  to 
the  road." 

"  Why  do  you  ask  ?  "  she  said  with  some  petulance. 
"  You  must  treat  me  as  if  I  were  a  bag  of  potatoes." 

"  I  asked  because —  Hugh  was  getting  miserably 

confused,  and  could  not  find  a  way  to  shape  his  sen 
tences  ;  "  because  I  thought  it  unfair,  at  least,  without 
telling  you  how  dearly  I  love  you."  He  had  blurted  it 
out  because  he  could  not  help  it,  and  they  stood  looking 
at  each  other  under  the  trees,  Oriana's  face  reflecting  all 
the  confusion  that  was  manifest  in  his. 

"  I  will  leave  you  here  until  I  can  get  assistance,  unless 
you  say  I  can  help  you  now." 

"  Don't  you  think  this  is  taking  a  mean  advantage  ? " 
and  the  tears  welled  up  into  her  eyes. 

"  I  did  not  intend  to,  but  quite  the  contrary.  You 
have  only  to  choose.  If  it  is  disagreeable  to  you  to  have 
me  help  you,  I  will  leave  you  now  and  go  for  a  carriage. 
Here  is  a  dry  place  where  you  can  sit." 

Oriana  had  entirely  forgotten  the  pain  in  her  foot. 
"  If  I  let  you  help  me,"  she  answered  iilogically,  flying 
away  from  the  point,  and  now  quite  angry,  "  you  will  use 
the  permission  against  me  by  and  by." 

"  No  ;  I  shall  use  nothing  against  you,  Miss  Freeborn. 
I  had  to  tell  you  because  I  thought  it  manly.  It  told 
itself.  Shall  I  go  for  a  carriage  ?  " 

"  But  you  have  sprung  the  whole  thing  upon  me  so 
suddenly  without  warning."  She  was  almost  sobbing 
now.  "  I  want  time  to  think  it  over.  I  want  a  great  deal 
of  time — perhaps  a  year." 

"  Take  all  the  time  you  want,"  said  Hugh,  putting  his 


362  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

arm  around  her.  He  could  not  help  letting  a  triumph 
ant  look  peep  out  of  his  eyes. 

"  Well,"  said  she,  with  a  sigh,  looking  terribly  per 
plexed,  "  you  had  better  get  me  out  of  the  woods.  I 
don't  want  to  be  left  here  alone." 

Hugh  just  tightened  his  hold  about  her  waist  a  little, 
and  lifted  her  lightly  until  her  small  pretty  feet  in  their 
neat  boots  were  free  from  the  ground.  When  they 
reached  the  highway  she  insisted  on  being  set  down. 

"  Did  you  ever,"  she  said  whimsically,  with  her  eyes 
still  dewy — "  did  you  ever  know  any  thing  so  ridiculous 
as  this  ?  I  had  made  a  promise  to  myself  that  I  would 
never,  never — that  I  would  show  the  world  what  a  noble 
woman  an  old  maid  can  be." 

Hugh's  face  was  suffused  with  happiness. 

"  And  I  too,"  he  said,  "  had  made  a  promise  that  I 
would  never,  never.  But  wrhen  we  are  very  much  in  love 
every  thing  is  changed." 

I  am  not  quite  sure,  but  I  think  Oriana  and  Hugh  will 
be  married  soon  and  will  go  to  Italy  to  live  for  a  few 
years.  It  is  possible  the  book  on  the  "  Poetry  and  His 
tory  of  Cathedrals  "  may  yet  be  written. 


CHAPTER   XXXVIII. 

A     SPIRITUAL     EXPERIENCE. 

A  LTHOUGH  opinions  and  ideas  change  but  slowly 
t\  in  the  country,  it  would  now  be  impossible  for  Dr. 
Abijah  Manners  to  preach  the  sermons  he  once  thun 
dered  forth  in  the  village  meeting-house,  while  beating 
the  dust  from  the  pulpit  cushion  witrj  his  strong  red  fists. 
The  articles  of  faith  are  still  subscribed,  but  in  life  many 
of  them  are  inoperative.  The  young  minister,  when  he 
was  ordained,  passed  his  examination  on  eternal  punish 
ment  and  foreordination  more  by  quickness  of  wit  and 
subtle  new  interpretations  than  by  general  soundness  of 
doctrine.  If  he  were  now  to  preach  the  wrath  of  God 
and  the  eternal  burning,  in  the  plain  unvarnished  style  of 
old  Dr.  Abijah,  the  people  would  rise  up  in  fear  and 
trembling  and  depart  from  the  church.  Modern  nerves 
and  the  new  sensitiveness  to  all  kinds  of  suffering,  in 
cluding  the  pains  of  the  lower  animals,  can  not  stand  the 
old  style  of  preaching. 

It  will  not  do  to  take  curse  words  out  of  the  Old 
Testament  and  fling  them  broad-cast  among  refined 
modern  people,  as  the  old  doctor  did,  thus  cutting  a 
swath  through  sin  and  iniquity  as  clean  as  his  mighty 
row  in  the  haying-field.  Even  the  stanchest  ortho 
dox  members,  though  they  would  not  acknowledge  it, 
demand  a  diluted  theology.  The  young  minister  con 
fines  himself  mainly  to  the  New  Testament.  It  would 
not  matter  so  very  much  to  him — if  he  could  preserve 
the  Book  of  Psalms,  of  Job  and  of  Isaiah — save  as  a  mat 
ter  of  history,  if  the  remainder  of  that  wonderful  old 


364  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

book  were  stricken  out  of  existence.  But  Dr.  Abijah 
Manners  drew  from  the  Old  Testament  as  from  an 
arsenal  those  mighty  arms  with  which  he  attacked  the 
world,  the  flesh,  and  the  devil.  Now,  there  is  a  great 
deal  of  implied  doubt  as  to  the  existence  of  a  personal 
devil.  Even  the  young  parson  has  been  heard  to  say 
that  our  popular  Satan  owes  his  creation  mainly  to  Mil 
ton,  and  is  not  found  in  the  Bible,  and  the  influence  of 
Milton  on  the  Calvinistic  theology  of  a  former  age  is 
passing  away.  Such  opinions,  uttered  in  his  own  parish, 
in  his  own  pulpit,  as  one  may  say,  ought  to  make  old  Dr. 
Abijah  turn  in  his  coffin.  But  the  people  receive  them 
calmly,  and  a  few  have  gone  in  Biblical  criticism  much 
beyond  any  thing  the  young  minister  would  dare  to  utter 
from  the  sacred  desk. 

It  is  remarked  that  if  he  preaches  a  very  liberal  ser 
mon  on  one  Sunday,  he  is  apt  to  tone  down  the  im 
pression  on  the  next,  by  giving  a  doctrinal  discourse 
which  seems  partially  to  fill  the  gap  between  him  and  the 
old-fashioned  believer.  So  regularly  do  these  changes 
occur  that  a  joke  has  gone  forth  in  the  village  to  the 
effect  that  the  minister  has  an  orthodox  and  a  heterodox 
foot.  When  he  is  standing  on  his  orthodox  foot  some 
people  do  not  particularly  care  to  hear  him.  The  judge, 
the  doctor,  Mr.  Worldly  Wiseman,  and  men  of  that  class, 
are  generally  on  hand  when  there  is  any  prospect  of  his 
launching  out  and  saying  something  to  shake  the  old  dry 
bones.  It  has  been  feared  at  times  that  he  might  lose 
his  balance  and  go  entirely  over  to  advanced  liberalism. 
But  he  knows  so  well  when  to  advance  and  when  to  re 
treat  that  there  is  little  danger  of  such  a  catastrophe.  It 
is  not  at  all  probable  that  he  will  ever  lose  the  center  of 
gravity  by  standing  too  long  on  his  heterodox  leg  ;  by 
shifting  skillfully  from  one  side  to  the  other  he  enlivens 
his  discourses  and  keeps  up  the  interest  of  the  congrega 
tion. 


THE  OLD  AND  NEW  CHURCH.  365 

He  is  deeply  interested  in  the  new  interpretations  of 
old  doctrines  which  so  much  lessen  their  native  force. 
He  feels  an  ardent  enthusiasm  for  building  the  new 
church  just  outside  the  old,  using  the  ancient  substruc 
ture  and  such  of  the  aged  timbers  as  are  not  too  rotten 
and  worm-eaten.  One  old  farmer  describes  the  parson's 
plan  of  preserving  all  that  is  valuable  in  the  past  as  sim 
ilar  to  the  history  of  a  boy's  jack-knife  :  First  he  lost  the 
blade,  and  had  the  old  handle  fitted  to  a  new  one.  Then 
the  old  handle  wore  out  and  was  replaced  by  another. 
Still  it  was  the  same  old  knife.  Who  can  tell,  when  the 
old  church  is  thoroughly  revamped,  whether  it  will  retain 
any  of  the  ancient  material  ? 

Some  of  his  parishioners  keep  step  with  him  in  all 
his  efforts.  Others  are  still  in  doubt,  as  they  wish 
to  see  more  clearly  than  they  now  do  the  direction 
in  which  the  new  current  is  setting.  They  are  mainly 
hard-working  fanners  from  the  hills,  and  old  people 
who  have  been  brought  up  on  strong  Gospel  meat. 
The  tillers  of  a  poor  soil  have  but  little  consolation 
in  their  daily  round  of  toil  save  in  religion.  They 
want  it  undiluted  and  positive.  No  doctrine  shading  off 
at  the  edges  into  euphemisms  and  vague  declarations  of 
the  love  of  God  can  sustain  them.  They  want  to  know  if 
there  is  any  thing  positive  to  lay  hold  of  in  the  hour  of 
need. 

To  be  sure,  a  number  of  the  mountain  farmers  have 
grown  stolidly  indifferent  to  religion.  They  never  go  to 
meeting,  and  confine  their  acts  of  outward  worship  on  a 
Sunday  to  putting  on  a  clean  shirt  and  whittling  a  pine 
stick  as  they  sit  on  the  stone  wall,  dull  and  ruminative. 
They  could  give  you  a  ready  opinion  about  "  beef  crit 
ters  "  and  sheep  raising,  but  none  at  all  as  to  their 
immaterial  interests.  They  have  lost  the  faith  of  their 
fathers,  and  they  do  not  speculate.  There  is  little  of  the 
blessing  of  the  seventh  day  left  to  them  but  the 


VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

sensation  of  rest  and  vacancy.  The  women  and  children 
of  these  people  occasionally  gather  at  a  school-house 
meeting  where  a  traveling  exhorter  gives  them  a  shout 
ing  discourse,  and  they  pray  and  sing  lively  psalm  tunes. 
But  most  of  the  men  have  lost  interest  in  this  sort  of 
thing.  These,  however,  are  people  who  live  in  the  lone 
lier  recesses  of  the  hills.  Religious  farmers  are  still  as  a 
body  the  mainstay  and  support  of  the  village  church — 
the  old  First  Church,  as  it  has  always  been  called.  They 
come  of  a  Sunday  morning  in  their  wagons  and  carriages 
with  their  families,  dressed  in  their  best  broadcloth  suits, 
which  sit  rather  uneasily  upon  them — well  brushed,  clean, 
with  tanned  faces,  and  hands  knotted  and  browned  by 
toil. 

They  have  a  sense  of  the  divine  ordering  of  nature 
as  they  till  their  fields  and  endure  the  hard  winters. 
They  are  sober,  solid  men,  who  find  the  Bible  a  well- 
spririg  of  consolation  and  comfort.  Even  in  this  trashy- 
newspaper,  cheap-book-making  age  they  cling  to  it  faith 
fully  as  the  rock  of  their  faith — a  sober,  serious  type, 
believers  still,  who,  though  they  have  relaxed  the  stern 
family  discipline  of  their  Puritan  fathers,  and  the  awful 
severity  with  which  the  Sabbath  was  formerly  kept,  still 
live  as  in  the  light  of  the  All-Seeing  Eye,  and  acknowl 
edge  divine  guidance  and  the  terrors  of  the  moral  law. 
These  farmers,  survivors  of  an  elder  generation  who  laid 
the  foundations  of  character  in  New  England,  are  not  so 
numerous  as  formerly,  but  they  do  exist. 

The  men  tie  their  teams  under  the  long  shed  near  the 
First  Church,  and,  in  their  Sunday  boots,  go  creaking  to 
their  pews.  No  other  country  can  show  such  a  body  of 
strong,  earnest-thinking  tillers  of  the  soil,  who  talk  over 
the  sermon  as  they  go  homeward  from  meeting,  and  look 
up  the  authorities  and  ponder  on  the  thoughts  in  the 
fields.  They,  too,  perceive  that  the  world  is  moving, 
that  great  tides  of  opinion  and  conviction  are  carrying 


LACK  OF  TRUE    COMPANIONSHIP.  367 

them  on,  they  know  not  whither.  The  light  of  a  new 
day  has  slowly  crept  into  their  valleys,  and  modified  all 
the  ancient  life  and  practice.  The  old  vexed  questions 
of  the  salvation  of  unbaptized  infants  and  the  redemption 
of  good  heathen  people  who  have  not  known  the  light  of 
Christ  seem  almost  antiquated,  now  that  such  a  strain 
has  come  on  so  many  of  the  more  vital  issues.  The 
young  clergyman  does  not  give  this  class  of  his  hearers 
an  opportunity  to  go  to  sleep  in  their  pews.  He  stirs 
them  up  and  keeps  them  alive  to  the  questions  of  the 
day.  Only  a  few  deaf  men  and  old  women  occasionally 
indulge  in  a  comfortable  nap  during  sermon  time. 

The  young  clergyman  keeps  his  congregation  well 
together,  which  in  these  lax  and  degenerate  days  is  a 
great  achievement.  It  is  thought  in  a  few  years  he  may 
be  called  to  a  city  pulpit,  and  then,  his  friends  say,  when 
the  villagers  are  thrown  back  on  some  fossil  of  the 
ancient  unprogressive  school,  they  will  know  how  to 
prize  this  live  man.  The  young  minister  feels,  as  do  the 
most  intellectual  people  in  small  communities,  the  lack 
of  sympathetic  companionship.  The  most  active-growing 
mind  in  a  narrow  sphere,  finds  no  one  to  keep  step  with 
him.  He  feels  like  a  lonely  forester  breaking  paths  for 
his  own  feet,  with  no  comrade  to  cry  well  done  or  give 
him  godspeed.  He  is  hungry  and  thirsty  for  the  com 
munion  of  liberal  souls.  For  this  reason  the  young 
clergyman  seizes  with  avidity  upon  any  stranger  who 
visits  the  village  and  has  interests  in  his  own  line  of 
thought  and  inquiry.  Then  he  finds  relief  in  unpacking 
his  breast  of  all  its  burdens,  and  basks  in  the  rest  and 
refreshment  that  comes  from  an  hospitable  soul. 

Last  summer  a  theological  student,  a  young  man  of 
great  promise  and  considerable  anticipatory  fame,  was 
staying  among  us.  His  mother,  a  widow,  lives  in  the 
outskirts  of  the  village  and  is  distinguished  as  a  mother 
in  Israel,  a  pious,  praying  woman,  who  by  her  ceaseless 


368  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

petitions  had  done  much  to  influence  her  son's  course. 
This  young  man,  although  he  had  another  year  at  the 
theological  seminary,  was  considered  so  remarkable  it 
was  arranged  that  at  his  ordination  he  should  at  once 
take  charge  of  an  important  church.  He  had  already 
preached  in  various  pulpits.  His  fame  had  gone  abroad 
in  the  congregation,  and  a  brilliant  future  seemed  assured. 
When  he  came  to  the  village  on  his  last  vacation  the 
young  clergyman  found  him  among  the  elect,  foreor 
dained  to  be  his  friend  and  brother.  Hugh  was  pre 
occupied  and  unsocial  in  those  days,  and  the  minister 
felt  himself  to  be  exceedingly  fortunate  in  discovering  a 
rich  estate  in  the  nature  of  this  brilliant  young  man,  to 
whom  he  could  preach  all  his  sermons  before  he  delivered 
them  in  the  pulpit. 

Jerome,  as  I  will  call  him,  was  a  fine  Greek  and  He 
brew  scholar.  It  was  thou  -ht  if  he  were  to  go  abroad 
and  take  a  colirse  in  a  German  university  he  might  fill  a 
theological  chair  in  one  of  our  largest  colleges.  The 
pious  old  ladies  beamed  upon  him.  The  young  lady 
church  members  blushed  as  they  thought  how  much  he 
would  need  a  wife  to  help  him  fill  his  exalted  position. 
He  was  a  child  of  many  hopes  ;  a  very  Samuel,  dedicated 
to  the  temple  service  from  his  earliest  years.  But,  with 
all  these  shining  prospects,  our  young  minister  noticed 
that  Jerome  was  not  happy.  He  suspected  the  canker- 
worm  of  modern  doubt  had  begun  thus  early  to  burrow 
in  his  mind.  But  with  his  optimistic  view  of  things  it 
did  not  trouble  him.  Has  not  a  great  poet  said  an  honest 
doubt  is  worth  half  the  creeds  ?  It  might  be  well  for 
Jerome  to  pass  through  the  ordeal.  He  would  doubtless 
come  out  stronger  and  braver  for  the  trial. 

But  Jerome's  trouble  was  deeper  than  our  young  min 
ister  suspected.  It  was  laying  the  axe  at  the  very  root 
of  the  tree.  When  he  prayed  he  was  often  cold  and 
without  any  true  feeling  of  supplication  or  worship. 


DOUBTS  AXD   QUESTIONINGS.  369 

The  thought  that  labor  is  prayer  tormented  him.  He 
was  committed  to  a  life  of  exhortation  and  lip  service, 
but  the  world  requires  just  deeds  that  bear  within  them 
the  power  and  potency  of  the  love  of  God.  The  talking 
age  is  passing  away,  so  he  reasoned,  as  he  thought  of  a 
possible  new  church  filled  with  a  pentecostal  life,  and  of 
himself  as  a  possible  reformer,  but,  like  the  heavenly 
vision  of  the  prophet,  there  was  no  modern  temple 
therein.  To  preach  to  respectable,  elegant,  well-dressed, 
well-fed  people  about  sin,  righteousness,  and  judgment 
to  come,  while  the  great  wretched,  reckless,  suffering 
world  stormed  by  the  church  door,  indifferent  to  parson 
and  creed,  loathing  sermon,  and  prayer,  and  psalm, 
seemed  to  him  a  service  he  could  not  perform,  not  even 
for  the  ten  thousand  dollar  salary  it  was  thought  that  he 
would  soon  be  able  to  command. 

He  went  abroad  alone  at  night  revolving  these 
things  in  his  soul,  wondering  what  the  experience 
was  through  which  he  was  passing,  and  whither  it 
would  lead  him.  If  it  proved  to  be  the  spirit  of 
truth  and  life,  he  was  determined  to  follow  wherever  it 
might  beckon.  This  was  reality.  All  else  he  had  known 
compared  with  it,  even  his  preaching  and  life  in  the 
divinity  school,  seemed  like  an  illusion.  He  wandered 
about  late,  when  the  nights  were  cloudy  and  the  air  good 
for  transmitting  distant  sounds.  Sometimes  by  putting 
his  ear  close  to  the  ground  he  could  hear  a  train  come 
into  a  station  six  miles  off.  He  alone  was  awake  ;  his 
ear  was  open  to  catch  some  message,  some  whisper  of 
truth»from  afar.  He  lay  on  a  hill-top  when  the  midnight 
moon  arose  solemn  and  sad  in  its  first  glances  at  the 
earth.  A  slight  breeze  rustled  the  grass  and  leaves  like 
the  footstep  of  a  timid  wild  creature.  He  felt  alone  in 
the  universe  with  his  problem,  and  the  stars  in  strips  of 
sky  peering  through  the  thinned  boughs  could  give  him 
no  answer. 


37°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

He  looked  down  upon  the  dark,  quiet  roofs  of  the 
village,  and  wondered  how  people  could  live  without 
moments  of  soul-stirring  quest  for  new  light — live,  in 
a  quiet  vegetative  way,  winding  their  clock  at  the  same 
moment  every  night  and  going  to  bed  exactly  on  the 
stroke  of  ten.  The  young  minister  was  so  cock-sure  he 
was  in  the  right  line  that  Jerome  could  get  no  consola 
tion  thinking  of  him. 

One  night  Jerome  had  gone  home  late,  had  crept  into 
the  house  and  kindled  his  lamp  without  waking  his 
mother.  He  chanced  to  take  up  a  volume  that  lay  on 
the  table.  It  was  not  the  Bible  ;  it  was  a  modern  novel, 
and  as  he  opened  it  his  eye  fell  on  the  words,  "  He 
descended  into  hell,"  in  the  context  of  part  of  the  dis 
course  of  one  of  the  characters  in  the  book.  Suddenly  a 
new  meaning  of  those  mystic  words  flashed  into  his 
mind.  The  descent  into  hell  was  here  in  this  world.  It 
meant  work  in  the  earthly  hells,  among  the  masses  in 
prison-pens  and  noisome  places,  where  the  creeping  pes 
tilence  of  moral  and  physical  corruption  runs  riot.  How 
could  a  spiritual  teacher  and  guide  of  men  know  any 
thing  of  life's  realities  without  making  this  descent  into 
hell,  and  striving,  not  for  the  salvation  of  the  rich,  the  re 
spectable,  the  virtuous,  but  of  the  hopelessly  wretched  and 
degraded,  who  rot,  fester,  and  die  for  want  of  a  Saviour  ? 
He  bowed  his  head  on  his  arms  on  the  table  before  him  and 
sat  thus  the  whole  night  through,  revolving  all  the  past  and 
all  the  future. 

But  when  the  dawn  came,  silvery,  washed  white,  like 
a  face  bathed  in  tears,  he  arose  a  new  man.  All 
doubt  had  departed  from  his  being,  and  the  work  be 
fore  him  lay  clearly  mapped  out  like  a  long  forward 
road  through  a  dense  wilderness  on  which  the  sun  is 
shining.  His  brilliant  prospects,  his  old  dreams  of  use 
fulness  and  honor  faded  away  before  his  high  calling  to 
labor  for  humanity,  and  he  was  calm  and  joyous.  It  was 


"/  FOLLOW   THE  LIGHT  I  SEE."  371 

long  before  he  could  make  his  mother  understand  what 
had  happened. 

"  And  do  you  mean,  Jerome,"  she  said,  weeping,  "  that 
you  intend  to  give  up  the  ministry  ?  " 

"  Yes,  mother.  I  can  not  now  belong  to  a  separate 
order.  I  do  not  wish  to  wear  any  badge  or  have  any 
handle  to  my  name  that  distinguishes  me  from  others. 
I  must  work  as  a  man  among  men." 

"  I  can't  understand  it,"  she  moaned.  "  I  don't  know 
what  it  means." 

"  I  know  you  don't,"  he  answered  gently  ;  "  but  can 
you  believe  me,  mother,  when  I  tell  you  it  is  a  new 
birth " 

"  It  ain't  like  any  conversion  I  ever  heard  of,"  she 
went  on  sobbing,  "  and  you  a  child  of  prayer.  Your 
father  prayed  over  you  when  you  was  little,  and  hoped 
you  would  be  a  minister.  He  longed  to  see  the  day,  but 
died  without  the  sight.  And  here  am  I,  old  and  tottering 
on  the  edge  of  the  grave  ;  and  when  I  thought  you  was 
safe  in  the  kingdom  you  come  and  tell  me  you  have  got 
converted  in  some  unheard-of  way.  How  do  you  know 
it  ain't  of  the  devil  leading  to  perdition  ? " 

"  I  only  follow  the  light  I  see,  mother.  I  have  never 
known  Satan  to  advise  men  to  abandon  the  self-seeking 
spirit,  and  take  up  a  hard  lot  for  the  sake  of  others." 

It  was  all  he  could  say.  The  experience  was  as  strange 
to  him  as  to  the  villagers,  who  wondered  over  it,  and 
would  not  believe  its  deep  significance.  The  age  of  pro 
found  spiritual  experience,  leading  to  sacrifice,  they 
thought,  had  passed  by,  like  miracles  and  speaking  with 
tongues.  Any  remarkable  display  of  religious  sincerity 
seemed  as  strange  as  it  would  to  see  a  bush  on  the 
mountain  side  bursting  out  with  the  flame  that  Moses 
beheld,  or  an  angel  stirring  the  waters  of  a  river  pool, 
that  the  sick  might  be  healed.  Of  course  cranks,  and 
spiritualists,  and  visionaries,  like  Job  Bird,  pretend  to 


37 2  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

have  great  experiences  in  these  days,  but  Jerome  was 
none  of  these.  He  was  a  man  abandoning  a  brilliant 
career,  the  highest  worldly  advantages,  because  he  thought 
he  heard  the  still  small  voice  of  the  Lord,  saying  :  "  Follow 
me,  and  serve  where  I  show  you  work  to  do." 

The  young  minister  felt  deep  sympathy  for  Jerome. 
He  was  touched  in  the  depths  of  his  soul  when  he  saw 
the  new  light  of  happiness  that  shone  in  the  young  man's 
face,  although  he  could  not  approve  the  course  he  had 
taken,  in  yielding  to  what  might  prove  a  passing  enthu 
siasm,  an  impulse  born  in  a  moment  of  exaltation.  He 
was  yielding  to  what  seemed  to  him  a  dangerous  individ 
ualism  in  rejecting  the  church  as  an  organized  field  of 
labor — the  best  perhaps  that  could  be  devised. 

The  day  Jerome  left  the  village  to  go  and  take  up  his 
new  career  the  young  minister  walked  with  him  several 
miles  down  the  valley,  and  finally  bade  him  farewell  in  a 
little  wooded  dell  beside  the  placid  river.  He  almost 
shed  tears  at  parting  with  his  friend,  and  as  he  saw 
Jerome  set  off  down  the  road  toward  the  next  town,  with 
the  brilliant  tints  of  autumn  hung  out  on  all  the  hillsides, 
and  the  blue  distance  beckoning,  and  heard  his  cheery 
voice  calling  back  a  last  good-by,  he  thought  verily  he 
would  have  gone  with  that  new  apostle  of  human  brother 
hood  and  worked  by  his  side  had  it  not  been  for  the  wife 
and  babies  at  home  and  those  affections,  knotted  into  the 
heart-strings,  which  so  often  make  cowards  and  reaction 
aries  of  the  world's  would-be  reformers  and  high  priests 
of  progress. 


CHAPTER   XXXIX. 

HOW    BILL    FULLER    WAS    INDEMNIFIED. 

1AHE  village  seems  lapped  in  a  golden  reverie  under  a 
'  hazy  sky,  languorous  and  warm.  The  canopy  of 
elm  trees  is  bronzed  with  pale  gleams,  and  the  finely 
divided  foliage  shines  against  the  sky  and  imparts  the 
peacefulness  of  perfect  repose.  The  flaming  clumps  of 
trees  here  and  there  through  the  valley  seem  dissolved 
like  rich  jewels  in  this  Indian-summer  haze,  and  melt 
into  the  general  tone  of  restfulness  as  music  melts  into 
silence.  The  long  placid  reaches  of  the  river  do  not 
ripple,  so  still  is  the  air,  but  find  joy  in  reflecting  all  of 
heaven  and  earth  they  can  hold.  Like  satin  sheen  those 
smooth  reaches  stretch  out,  darkening  under  the  willows 
and  the  white  birches,  reflecting  the  varied  hues  of  the 
trees  on  the  bank,  the  scarlet  of  the  maple,  the  russet 
and  crimson  of  the  oak,  the  yellow  of  the  ash  and 
chestnut,  the  parti-colored  dogwood,  and  the  ground 
tints  now  so  splendid  from  the  colors  of  weeds,  grasses, 
and  late  flowers. 

The  winter  apples  are  now  gathering  in  the  orchards, 
and  the  cider-mills  are  at  work  sending  puffs  of  odor  out 
into  the  road.  Great  activity  prevails  around  barns 
where  the  grain  is  threshed.  They  are  digging  potatoes 
in  the  fields,  and  the  late  corn  comes  to  the  harvester's 
hands  with  the  full  ear.  Brown  October,  flecked  with 
glorious  colors  and  bearing  such  ample  fruitage,  brings 
these  soft  lights  of  memory  and  poetic  feeling,  as  if 
once  a  year  she  would  make  all  labor  look  beautiful,  and 
transmute  the  troubles  and  sorrows  of  mankind  into  a 
psalm  of  praise.  The  old  unpainted  houses  seem  changed 


374  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

as  they  stand  in  the  magic  Indian-summer  light,  and  the 
woodbine  reddens  on  the  gray  wall.  The  silk  of  the 
milkweed  floats  in  the  air,  and  gleams  like  a  feather 
dropped  from  the  wing  of  some  good  angel.  The  air  is 
full  of  pleasant  odors  from  ripening  leaves  and  late 
herbs,  and  the  fallen  foliage  rustles  crisp  around  one's 
feet,  singing  a  soft  little  good-by  song  to  summer,  and 
saying,  "  As  I  have  fallen  so  you  shall  fall,  you  who  hang 
so  bravely  now  on  the  tree  of  life."  The  village  looks 
larger,  more  spacious,  more  hospitable  than  its  wont. 
House  doors  stand  open  still,  and  children  play  in  the 
yards  and  gardens  at  "  tag  "  and  "  touch  the  goal."  Old 
people  come  out  to  breathe  the  air,  glad  that  there  is  as 
yet  no  necessity  for  hugging  the  winter  fire  to  preserve  a 
spark  of  life  in  their  old  bones. 

The  housewives  are  out  potting  their  choice  plants, 
taking  up  bulbs,  and  transferring  the  oleander,  the  lemon 
tree,  and  the  large  stocky  geraniums  to  their  sunny 
south  windows.  Who  can  reckon  the  courage  this  little 
rescue  from  summer's  green  things  has  given  to  lonely, 
sad  women  in  cold  dark  days  when  faith  and  hope  are 
ready  to  fade  out  of  the  human  heart  ? 

One  day  the  doctor  was  driving  his  gray  horse  and 
old  mud-bespattered  chaise  (for  it  had  rained  in  the 
night)  through  the  village  street,  when  suddenly  the 
sun  came  out  as  warm  as  June,  and  sent  a  shimmer 
of  soft  light  down  upon  the  earth,  while  the  gray 
mists  rolled  up  into  fleecy  clouds,  and  the  bright  trees 
smiled  gently  to  each  other,  and  all  things  looked  very 
fair.  The  doctor  was  in  a  happy  mood.  He  had  put 
aside  all  thoughts  of  his  patients  and  his  uncollected 
bills,  and  had  forgotten  the  regret  that  sometimes  gnawed 
at  his  vitals  because  he  had  not  lived  in  a  larger  sphere 
and  exercised  a  wider  influence  among  men.  He  knew 
himself  to  be  a  first-class  man  in  a  third-class  village, 
spending  his  life  among  obscure  people,  with  few  to 


OUGHT    THERE    TO   BE  A    FUNERAL?          375 

share  his  thoughts  or  understand  his  aims.  If  he  had 
gone  early  to  a  city  and  struggled  mightily  for  a  few 
years,  he  might  have  taken  his  proper  position  among 
those  high  up  in  his  own  profession.  But  here  he  was 
rusting  away  year  by  year  as  he  drove  about  in. his  shabby 
wagon — growing  older  and  by  no  means  richer,  fretting 
his  soul  out  over  the  wants  and  woes,  the  weaknesses 
and  wickednesses  of  his  neighbors.  But  this  morning  a 
delicate  reconciling  spirit  seemed  to  shed  balm  on  the 
air.  The  doctor  was  all  tuned  up  musically,  and  he  felt 
his  heart  glow  with  suppressed  poetry.  Many  choice 
and  well-beloved  lines  came  to  his  lips  as  he  drove  along 
the  country  roads. 

Just  as  he  turned  Peckham's  corner  into  Main  Street, 
in  this  good  frame  of  mind,  feeling  that  he  could  leave 
the  care  and  the  meaning  of  the  universe  to  its  Creator, 
while  he  did  his  own  nearest  duty,  he  saw  a  tall,  thin 
woman,  with  no  suggestion  of  tournure,  in  a  faded  calico 
dress  and  sun-bonnet,  beckoning  to  him  from  the  side 
walk.  He  drew  up  to  the  curb,  half-provoked  at  being 
forced  out  of  his  happy,  tranquil  mood  by  that  old  maid, 
Melissa  Tooler. 

"  I  thought  I  would  ask  you,"  the  woman  began,  in 
the  spiritless  tone  common  to  her,  u  whether  you  think 
there  ought  to  be  a  funeral  ? " 

"  The  devil,"  returned  the  doctor  impulsively,  thrust 
ing  his  head  out  of  the  hood  of  the  chaise  and  turning 
very  red  in  the  face. 

"  Don't  use  profane  language,"  the  woman  returned, 
in  a  mildly  rebuking  snuffle.  "  Death  is  a  dretful  solemn 
thing." 

"  Sometimes  it  is,"  returned  the  doctor  rather  brutally, 
"  and  sometimes  it  is  a  great  relief.  I  should  think  your 
sister  would  feel  glad  to  know  he  is  out  of  the  world." 

"I  don't  know  how  Sist'r  Ann  feels  about  that,"  re 
turned  the  other,  inclining  to  be  lachrymose,  "  but  she  is 


376  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

a  decent  woman  and  a  Christian,  and  she  wants  to  do 
every  thing  that's  proper." 

"Will  it  not  be  proper  to  have  him  buried  where 
he  is?" 

"  She's  had  to  dig  him  up  to  indemnify  him,"  returned 
the  woman,  putting  her  hand  up  to  her  eyes. 

The  doctor  was  suddenly  half-choked  with  laughter  at 
the  thought  of  digging  up  Bill  Fuller  to  "  indemnify 
him,"  but  he  managed  to  say  :  "As  soon  as  I  had  indem 
nified  him  I  should  put  him  right  back  in  the  same  place, 
and  cover  him  up  with  neatness  and  dispatch.  Then  if 
he  has  left  any  money  I  think  I  would  hire  a  brass-band 
and  give  a  party." 

The  woman  looked  at  him,  shocked  and  horrified. 
"  Doctor,"  she  said,  with  solemn  slowness,  "  I'm  afeared 
you  ain't  a  Christian.  It's  always  right  to  speak  as  kind 
as  we  can  of  the  dead." 

"  If  I  am  not  a  Christian,  I  am  not  a  hypocrite,"  said 
the  doctor,  hotly,  "  and  I  should  never  shed  any  crocodile 
tears  over  a  man  like  Bill  Fuller." 

Miss  Tooler  went  slowly  home,  rustling  the  dead 
leaves  with  her  large  shoes.  She  felt  that  the  doctor 
was  hard,  that  life  is  hard,  that  every  thing  is  hard  for 
most  folks,  and  especially  for  lone  women.  She  could 
not  have  told  why  she  should  cry  for  her  brother-in-law, 
Bill  Fuller,  who  had  been  a  very  bad  and  worthless  man, 
•but  there  was  a  sense  of  the  tragic  in  this  sudden  taking 
off  of  the  objectionable  Bill  that  made  her  sad.  She 
thought  it  all  over  as  she  was  walking  home — how  he 
had  abused  and  maltreated  "  Sist'r  Ann,"  and  had  hurt 
his  only  child,  laming  him  for  life,  and  then  having  com 
mitted  a  petty  crime,  had  abandoned  his  penniless 
family,  and  had  not  been  heard  of  for  fourteen  years. 
She  recalled  that  day,  so  memorable  to  both  of  them, 
when  word  came  through  a  newspaper  adve;.  iisement 
that  William  Fuller  had  been  found  drowned  in  the  East 


FOUND  DROWNED.  377 

River  at  New  York,  and  that  as  soon  as  the  coroner  had 
given  his  verdict  of  accidental  drowning  he  was  con 
signed  to  Potter's  Field.  Furthermore,  the  said  William,  it 
was  discovered,  had  left  a  small  property,  valued  at  about 
fifteen  hundred  dollars,  and  now  awaiting  the  appearance 
of  the  said  Fuller's  heirs.  Of  course,  "  Sist'r  Ann"  and 
her  lame  boy  were  the  only  possible  heirs  of  Bill  Fuller  if 
it  should  prove  true  "  that  he  had  gone  and  got  drownded" 
in  a  state  of  intoxication.  The  only  inconceivable  part 
of  it  was  that  Fuller  should  have  left  a  "  hansel "  of 
property.  It  made  the  cold  creeps  run  over  Miss  Tooler 
for  fear  this  might  be  thief's  money,  an  unholy  deposit 
which  was  coming  into  the  hands  of  unsuspecting  Sist'r 
Ann.  But  she  said  nothing  of  this  to  Mrs.  Fuller,  who 
was  already  very  much  bewildered  by  this  strange  news. 

Judge  Magnus  assured  Sist'r  Ann,  if  she  could  bring 
proof  of  her  marriage,  and  was  able  to  identify  the  dead 
man  as  her  scapegrace  husband,  there  would  be  no  diffi 
culty  in  securing  the  money.  Abundant  proof  of  the  mar 
riage  was  of  course  forthcoming,  and  the  doctor,  with  his 
usual  forethought,  advised  her  to  start  at  once  for  New 
York,  and  promised  to  consign  her  to  a  legal  friend  in  the 
metropolis  who  was  to  look  after  her  interests.  Mrs. 
Fuller  felt  very  much  as  if  she  had  been  struck  by  an 
earthquake.  She  had  taken  but  few  journeys  in  her  life, 
and  the  strange  dramatic  errand  on  which  she  was  going 
and  the  excitement  of  the  anticipated  trip  introduced 
confusion  into  all  her  ideas.  On  the  station  platform 
she  clung  to  her  son  Spence  and  to  Melissa,  and  they  all 
cried  as  if  Sist'r  Ann  had  been  going  straight  to  the  Can 
nibal  islands,  to  be  made  into  rather  tough  steaks  or 
chops  for  the  delectation  of  the  king. 

"  I'm  all  turned  round,"  sobbed  the  poor  woman, 
"  and  I  shan't  never  get  straight  and  untangled  again  the 
longest  day  I  live.  I  am  positive,  Melissy,  the  sun  rises 
in  the  west," 


37  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

But  the  train  came  along,  and  they  "  boosted  "  Sist'r 
Ann  into  the  car  in  her  collapsed  state,  and  handed  up 
her  basket  and  bag,  and  in  a  moment  she  had  disap 
peared  down  the  track.  So  Melissy  went  home  to  do  the 
housework,  and  to  assist  Spence,  who  was  not  very 
bright,  in  the  truck  garden.  She  had  years  ago  joined 
forces  with  her  sister,  and  they  had  set  up  a  little  busi 
ness,  principally  for  the  raising  of  asparagus  and  toma 
toes.  They  also  canned  fruit  and  vegetables  for  the 
market  in  the  season,  and  both  women  worked  a  good 
deal  out  of  doors.  They  were  adepts  in  the  art  of  New 
England  economy,  and  had  been  able  to  live  independ 
ent  and  above  board. 

Melissy  could  not  help  turning  over  in  her  mind  this 
strange  event,  the  like  of  which  had  never  happened 
before  in  her  family.  They  were  all  steady,  poor  folks, 
away  back  as  far  as  Gran'ther  Tooler's  time.  There  had 
never  been  a  murder,  or  suicide,  or  sudden  death  among 
them  ;  and,  as  far  as  she  could  recollect,  money  had  never 
come  into  the  family.  Bill  Fuller's  fifteen  hundred  dollars 
would  certainly  come  handy.  It  would  pay  off  the  mort 
gage  on  their  little  place,  and  make  life  a  great  deal  easier. 
Melissy  never  thought  of  the  years  of  hard  self-sacrific 
ing  toil  she  had  given  to  her  sister's  need.  That  tall, 
plain,  thin  woman  did  not  know  she  had  done  any  thing 
very  heroic.  She  had  no  envy,  hatred,  or  malice  in  her 
nature,  and  be  sure  she  did  not  "  begrudge  "  Sist'r  Ann 
any  thing.  She  wondered  what  her  sister  would  do  if  she 
found  out  Bill's  little  pile  was  thief-money.  The  thought 
made  her  shudder,  and  for  her  part,  in  such  case,  she 
could  wish  to  take  it  up  gently  with  a  pair  of  tongs  and 
lay  it  on  the  fire.  This  poor,  drab-colored  woman  had 
the  old  Puritan  conscience. 

Melissy's  imagination  worked  so  wildly  about  her 
sister,  and  there  was  so  much  excited  talk  among  the 
visiting  neighbors,  she  could  not  sleep,  for  the  first  time 


' '  SHALL  BRING  HIM  HOME. "  379 

in  her  life,  and  was  obliged  to  take  a  "  night-cap  "  to  get 
any  kind  of  rest.  This  gave  her  a  racking  headache  the 
next  day,  and  she  was  fast  breaking  down  in  a  fit  of  ill 
ness,  when  a  telegram  came  to  allay  some  of  her  anxiety 
about  Sist'r  Ann.  It  ran  thus  :  "  Am  obliged  to  have 
him  taken  up.  Shall  bring  him  home.  Ask  doctor  about 
funeral."  It  was  after  this  that  Melissy  spoke  to  the 
doctor.  She  knew  just  how  Sist'r  Ann  would  feel  about 
the  funeral.  All  the  villagers  would  turn  out  from  nat 
ural  curiosity,  and  a  big  rousing  funeral  would  be  a  real 
comfort  and  consolation  to  the  abused  and  forsaken 
wife.  It  would  partly  take  the  stigma  off  his  disreputable 
character  and  rehabilitate  him  in  public  esteem,  espe 
cially  as  he  had  left  property — a  god  all  villagers  bow 
down  to  at  times.  This  would  be  a  great  satisfaction  to 
poor  Sist'r  Ann. 

They  had  never  had  a  very  large  or  imposing  funeral 
in  the  family,  and  she  knew  how  much  a  certain 
class  of  country  folk  count  on  such  occasions.  She 
went  over  in  her  mind  all  the  minutest  details  ;  how 
she  must  stop  the  clock,  and  pull  down  the  shades,  and 
get  in  chairs  from  the  neighbors,  and  have  a  cold  colla 
tion  ready  for  the  mourners  and  friends.  She  lived  it  all 
over  and  began  baking  for  the  occasion  before  she  heard 
anything  further  from  her  sister.  On  the  evening  of  the 
sixth  day  that  poor  woman  came  into  the  house  quite 
unexpectedly,  looking  terribly  jaded,  and  with  black 
rings  round  her  eyes  and  great  hollows  in  her  sallow 
cheeks.  Melissy  ran  to  her  and  helped  her  into  the 
rocking-chair,  and  untied  her  bonnet-strings  and  took 
away  her  bag.  Sist'r  Ann  sank  down  and  heaved  a 
great  sigh.  This  was  so  different  from  the  home 
coming  she  expected  that  Melissy  was  dumbfounded,  but 
she  did  manage  to  say,  "  Sist'r  Ann,  where  is  it  ?  " 

"  Where  is  what  ? "  returned  Sist'r  Ann,  snappishly, 
closing  her  eyes  as  if  she  never  cared  to  open  them  again, 


VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

"  The  remains." 

"There  ain't  no  remains." 

Melissy  gasped,  and  fell  back  against  the  door.  She 
thought  her  sister  had  gone  daft,  but  Mrs.  Fuller 
opened  her  eyes,  and  looked  at  her  with  calm  but  weary 
defiance.  "  I  shan't  tell  you  a  word  of  any  thing  until  I 
have  some  tea.  I'm  tired  to  death,  and  worrited  and 
fretted  half  sick,"  and  with  that  her  bonnet  fell  off,  her 
hair  tumbled  down,  and  she  leaned  back  in  the  chair  and 
began  to  sob. 

Melissy  bestirred  herself  to  comfort  her  sister.  She 
bathed  her  hands  and  face,  put  a  pillow  to  her  back, 
smoothed  her  untidy  hair,  and  soon  had  a  steaming  cup 
of  the  fragrant  herb  in  her  hand. 

"  Oh,  it's  so  good  to  get  home,"  sighed  the  weary  one. 
"  Though  it's  ever  so  humble,  there's  no  place  like  home. 
Set  right  down,  Melissy,  and  you,  Spence,  and  I  will  tell 
you  all  I  have  been  through,  and  how  I  have  traipsed 
and  traipsed,  and  spent  my  money  and  my  time,  as  you 
may  say,  for  nothing.  You  see,  that  lawyer-friend  of  the 
doctor's,  he  met  me  at  the  cars,  and  was  kind,  and  took 
me  to  a  very  good  place  to  eat  and  sleep,  and  then  he 
attended  to  having  the  body  what  they  call  exhumed. 
So  the  morning  we  went  over  to  the  cemetery  to  take  a 
look  I  saw  two  women  in  deep  black  wandering  around 
among  the  graves.  And  the  undertaker,  who  was  a 
likely,  clever  man,  he  gave  me  the  wink.  And,  ses  he  to 
me  :  '  Them  two  are  claimants.  They  both  say  they  are 
wives  of  William  Fuller.  If  I  were  you  I  wouldn't  give 
myself  away.  I  guess  you  have  as  good  a  claim  as  any 
of  the  rest  of  his  wives.' 

" 4  Lord  a-mercy,'  cried  I,  horrified  and  consternade. 
4  What  bad  women  them  must  be.  I  am  his  only  true  and 
lawful  wife,  and  Spence  is  his  only  true  and  lawful  child. 
The  impudent  brazen  huzzies  !  to  come  here  and  own  to 
their  own  shame! ' 


THE  REMAINS.  3Sl 

"  But  the  minute  I  cast  my  eyes  on  the  remains,  I  seen 
it  wasn't  Bill  Fuller,  but  a  much  younger  and  heavier 
man — a  stocky,  short  person  with  thick  black  hair  and 
beard,  and  a  kind  of  a  Roman  nose.  Before  I  could  get 
a  chance  to  speak,  the  tallest  woman  in  black,  she  swept 
up  to  the  place,  and  putting  her  hand  on  the  breast  of  the 
remains,  she  said  in  a  mighty  high  tone  :  '  I  am  the  only 
true  and  lawful  wife  of  this  man,  William  Q.  Fowler.  I 
was  married  to  him  in  1881,  and  I  have  here  my  marriage 
certificate  to  prove  the  fact.  That  woman,'  pointing  to 
the  other  person  in  black,  '  never  was  married  to  him, 
and  she  has  no  kind  of  claim  to  the  property.  As  to 
that  old  imposter  yonder,'  pointing  to  me,  *  you  can  see 
for  yourself  what  she  is.  She's  old  enough  to  be  his 
mother,  and  her  claim  is  simply  ridiculous.' 

"  '  I'm  no  imposture,  mum,'  says  I,  firing  up,  '  and  I'd 
have  you  to  know  it.  I'd  no  sooner  set  my  eyes  on  the 
remains  than  I  knew  it  wasn't  Bill  Fuller,  my  husband 
that  was,  or  is,  the  Lord  only  knows  ;  and  as  to  William  Q. 
Fowler,'  ses  I,  pointing  to  the  high-strung  one  that  had 
spoken,  '  you're  welcome  to  him,  mum,  and  all  his  goods 
and  gear.  You  can  fight  it  out  with  t'other  woman.  I 
don't  believe  either  of  you  is  any  thing  better  than  you 
should  be,  but  I'd  have  you  to  know  that  I  am  a  pro 
fessing  Christian,  and  never  had  no  blots  on  my  fair 
name.'  And  with  that  I  kind  o'  staggered  away,  hardly 
knowing  what  I  was  about.  But  the  lawyer,  he  came 
right  behind,  and  I  could  see  he  was  just  dying  to  laugh. 
And,  ses  I  to  him,  '  I'll  pay  you  your  fee,  and  then  I'll 
be  off  home  by  the  next  train.'  And,  ses  I,  in  the  bitter 
ness  of  my  spirit,  '  if  old  Bill  Fuller  dies  twenty  times 
after  this,  I  won't  take  a  step  to  look  at  his  remains. 
I'll  let  any  body  claim  him  as  wants  to.' 

"  But  that  lawyer  was  very  nice-spoken,  and  he  per 
suaded  me  to  stay  a  day  or  two,  and  take  a  look  at  the 
city,  -so  as  I  shouldn't  lose  my  journey  altogether..  An.d 


382  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

he  gave  me  a  list  of  places  I  ought  to  see,  and  then  I 
began  my  tramps.  I  traipsed  and  I  traipsed  till  I  was 
nearly  dead.  Sometimes  I  rode  on  the  elevated,  as  they 
call  it,  a  railroad  set  up  in  the  air  on  stilts,  sometimes 
in  the  horse-cars,  but  most  times  I  traipsed.  I  went 
up  to  the  top  of  Trinity  Church  steeple,  three  hundred 
and  twenty-five  steps,  for  1  counted  'em,  and  I  thought 
before  I  got  there  you  would  have  your  funeral  after 
all,  Melissy.  I  walked  over  the  Brooklyn  Bridge,  and 
I  went  to  Central  Park  to  see  that  stone  thing  they 
call  Cleopatry's  Needle.  I  went  to  see  pictures  that 
didn't  look  like  any  thing  I  was  ever  acquainted  with 
and  statues  as  naked  as  the  day  they  was  born,  Melissy> 
and  finally  at  last  I  traipsed  up  to  Grant's  tomb.  I  kept 
it  for  the  last,  as  I  was  in  a  funereal  state  of  mind,  and  I 
thought  it  would  be  kind  of  soothing.  On  my  way  to 
the  tomb,  I  noticed  a  man  following  me,  a  crook-backed, 
old-codger  kind  of  a  man,  and  when  I  stopped  he  stopped, 
and  when  I  went  on  he  went  on.  He  was  done  up 
atwixt  two  boards,  a  kind  of  advertisement  called  a 
sandwich.  On  the  front  of  him  was  a  girl  in  a  party 
dress  washing  clothes,  and  on  his  back  a  baby  in  a  wash 
bowl  blowing  soap  bubbles. 

"  While  I  was  gazing  on  the  tomb  he  stepped  quite  in 
front  and  gazed  at  me  most  impudent,  and  finally  he 
took  a  step  nearer,  and  ses  he,  '  The  Lord  help  me,  if  this 
ain't  Ann.'  And  I  just  give  a  screech,  and  ses  I,  '  For 
all  the  world,  is  this  you,  Bill  Fuller  ? '  I  was  so  over 
come  !  It  was  a  great  deal  worse  than  not  finding  him 
in  the  coffin,  to  see  him  looking  like  a  regular  old  sot  in 
a  bad  hat,  done  up  in  boards  like  a  living  automedon. 

"  Well,  he  grinned,  and,  ses  he,  *  Ann,  I  saw  that  notice 
in  the  papers  about  my  getting  drownded  and  leaving  a 
pot  of  money,  and  I  knew  it  would  fetch  you  down  to 
the  city.  I  have  been  on  the  outlook  for  you,  and  all 
day  yesterday  I  watched  you  talking  to  policemen  on 


CONSOLATION    TAKEN  AWAY.  383 

street  corners,  and  I  knew  where  you  stopped.  It  was 
an  awful  disappointment,  now  wasn't  it,  not  to  find  me 
dead  and  buried  ? ' 

"  I  was  so  flustered  I  didn't  know  what  to  do  or  say, 
and,  ses  I  :  '  Bill,  this  is  the  worst  turn  you  ever  served 
me.' 

"  '  Sorry  I  couldn't  oblige  you  by  dying,  Ann.  But 
how  are  all  the  folks  at  home,  and  what  are  you  doing  ? ' 

"  '  You'd  better  ask  about  your  boy  as  you  lamed  for 
life,'  ses  I,  *  and  who  would  have  starved  if  it  hadn't 
been  for  me  and  Melissy  Tooler  going  into  the  sparrow- 
grass  business.' 

"  *  I'm  awful  sorry  about  the  boy,'  ses  Bill,  *  but  I  was 
in  liquor  when  I  did  it,  and  now  1  don't  drink  a  drop.' 
(I  could  smell  hisbreath  strong  as  any  thing  that  minute.) 
•  If  you'll  take  me  home  with  you,  I'll  try  to  do  better.' 

"  '  Take  you  home  !  Furyation  !  '  says  I.  ;  I  am  quit 
and  clear  of  you  long  ago  for  abandonment,  and  if  you 
come  near  I'll  have  you  arrested  on  that  old  thieving 
business.' 

"Well,  then  he  begged  and  whined  for  a  little  money." 

"  You  weren't  so  simple  as  that,"  exclaimed  Melissy 
Tooler. 

"  Yes,  I  was.  I  couldn't  bear  to  see  him  walking  round 
in  them  boards,  and  I  gave  him  all  the  money  I  had, 
over  and  above  enough  to  pay  my  way  back,  and  made 
him  take  them  right  off.  Yes,"  she  sighed,  "  I  had  hoped 
I  could  respect  him  a  little  the  rest  of  my  life.  If  we 
had  had  a  nice  funeral,  and  he  was  lying  up  there  on  the 
hill  with  a  tombstone  at  the  head  of  the  grave,  it  would 
be  some  consolation.  And  now  that  is  took  away  from 
me." 


CHAPTER  XL. 

TULLY    CICERO    OLDHAM    FALLS    INTO    ERROR. 

IF  you  live  in  a  village,  you  must  neighbor  it  or  live 
outside  the  swim.  If  you  have  more  tomatoes  in 
your  garden  than  you  can  use,  and  little  sweet  corn,  and 
Frisbies'  folks  next  door  have  much  sweet  corn  and  few 
tomatoes,  why  should  you  not  exchange  vegetables  over 
the  garden  fence  ?  And  standing  there  while  the  bread 
is  rising  in  the  pan,  you  may  as  like  as  not  fall  into  a 
little  talk  about  the  helps  that  are  at  hand  to  enable  us 
to  bear  life's  burdens,  or  the  immortality  of  the  soul,  and 
gleams  may  be  let  in  upon  household  cares  that  will  keep 
you  thinking  half  the  day.  Old  Miss  Fermenter  always 
used  to  get  to  preaching  when  she  ran  into  a  neighbor's 
back  door  on  an  errand  with  an  apron  over  her  head. 
An  errand  in  quest  of  a  recipe  for  root  beer,  or  the  best 
way  to  dye  an  old  red  shawl,  would  send  her  right  off  to 
sanctification  by  faith  and  the  inefficacy  of  works. 

When  the  little  sisters  had  a  load  of  unexpected  com 
pany  come  in  upon  them  the  other  day,  Mrs.  Judge 
Magnus  sent  her  dinner  right  over,  all  cooked  and  ready 
to  serve,  with  a  frozen-fruit  pudding  and  a  pot  of  delicious 
coffee  with  cream.  The  judge  was  obliged  to  dine  on 
bread  and  milk  and  cold  pie.  This  is  the  kind  of  neigh 
boring  that  whole-souled  woman  believes  in.  The  little 
sisters  mainly  live  on  what  they  call  picked-up  dinners, 
especially  when  there  is  no  one  with  them,  and  the  pick- 
upedness  of  the  meal  is  manifest  to  any  chance  comer. 
A  real  dinner  of  the  other  variety  is  a  red-letter  occasion 
for  them,  so  you  can  imagine  how  they  felt  when  Mrs. 
Magnus  sent  over  that  meal  for  Eben's  folks,  just  as  if 


ECONOMY— A    NOBLE  ART,  385 

it  had  come  in  the  four-cornered  sheet  the  apostle  saw 
let  down  from  heaven.  Mrs.  Magnus  is  rich,  but  she 
wishes  to  take  part  in  all  the  hospitalities  and  liberalities 
of  village  life,  to  feel  the  human  current  running  right 
through  her  house  from  garret  to  cellar,  like  a  great 
motor  nerve.  To  see  her  in  Washington  society  you 
would  never  suspect  it,  but  at  home  she  is  a  different 
person. 

The  young  married  women  are  let  into  the  sisterhood 
of  good  housekeepers,  and  made  welcome  to  share  in  all 
its  sifted  and  clarified  experience.  The  young  mother 
comes  over  with  her  first  baby,  the  most  remarkable 
child  ever  born,  and  puts  it  cuddled  to  sleep  on  the 
lounge,  and  then  she  and  the  initiated  go  into  long  talks  : 
how  to  turn  every  thing  to  the  best  account ;  when  you 
have  done  up  your  quince  sauce  how  to  make  a  delicious 
jelly  out  of  the  cores.  This  economy,  which  always  gets 
the  sweetness  out  of  the  core,  has  a  certain  beauty  of  its 
own.  It  is  in  the  order  of  nature  to  let  nothing  go  to 
waste,  but  by  cunning  chemistry  to  turn  its  refuse  into 
flowers,  its  brackishness  and  soot  into  splendid  colors 
and  sweet  perfumes.  The  housewife's  contrivance  to 
make  the  best  use  of  every  thing  when  she  puts  ashes  on 
the  cucumber  bed,  and  saves  the  smallest  scraps  for  the 
hens,  is  by  no  means  an  ignoble  art.  It  is  the  very  secret 
of  material  life,  the  saving  and  gathering  of  the  fragments 
into  the  baskets  of  the  parable,  that  nothing  be  lost. 

There  are  great  adepts  in  this  art  in  the  village,  and 
there  is  another  class  even  more  interesting,  for  they  mix 
something  spiritual  with  all  they  do,  not  only  with  their 
savings,  but  with  their  "  riz  biscuits  "  and  waffles,  their 
cup-cake  and  whipped  cream.  They  are  ladylike  house 
keepers  who  transmute  domestic  drudgery  into  grace. 
Though  they  know  all  about  the  lower  processes,  they 
are  never  too  busy  for  the  higher.  They  come  in  cool  and 
neat  from  some  serene  kitchen  depth  to  see  the  caller,  with 


386  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

hair  unruffled  and  collar  and  cuffs  quite  speckless.  They 
move  around  to  some  inward  music,  and  every  thing  falls 
into  line.  There  are  always  fresh  flowers  in  the  parlor 
vases,  and  their  work-baskets  look  like  fairy  gifts.  They 
read  a  great  deal  more  than  most  city  women,  and  have 
out  all  the  newest  books  of  poems  and  essays  from  the 
library.  There  are  two  women  who  get  along  without 
help,  save  for  the  washing  and  ironing  and  heavy  scrub 
bing.  Most  people  do  keep  help  now,  but  these  two  live 
in  such  an  exquisite  little  world  of  their  own  making, 
they  would  rather  do  for  themselves  than  have  an  Irish 
girl  messing  about,  irrupting  into  all  the  niceties  like  a 
bull  in  a  china  shop. 

Miss  Elmore  and  her  niece  Margaret  are  true  artists  in 
this  flower-like  housekeeping.  They  have  a  world  of 
comfort  together  in  all  their  doings,  and  seem  to  fit  each 
other  like  the  acorn  cup  and  the  acorn.  Their  life  is  a 
kind  of  harmony  into  which  sewing,  sweeping,  dusting, 
garden-work,  little  house  adornments,  the  care  of  flowers 
and  birds  are  twisted  and  twined.  They  read  their  books 
aloud,  taking  turns,  and  enjoying  the  comfort  and  snug- 
ness  of  perfect  sympathy.  Margaret  paints  and  plays 
the  piano,  alternating  her  idealities,  as  she  says,  with  the 
actualities  of  bed-making  and  keeping  rooms.  Every  one 
says,  "  What  a  fine  girl  Margaret  Elmore  is  !  "  Andjthe 
next  word  follows  of  itself  :  "  She  ought  to  get  a  good 
husband."  There  are  so  many  fine  girls  in  the  world  now 
who  ought  to  get  good  husbands.  Miss  Elmore  is  in  all 
things  a  lady,  old-fashioned,  delicate,  a  little  shy  and 
timid,  but  with  the  purest,  sweetest  instincts,  and  the 
finest  feelings.  Margaret  is  the  stronger  character  of  the 
two,  and  has  come  to  be  the  natural  protector  of  her 
aunt,  a  sort  of  head  of  the  family  in  the  form  of  a  rosy- 
cheeked,  dark-eyed  girl  of  twenty-three,  whose  every  eye 
lash  speaks  of  truth,  sincerity,  and  frankness.  Both  these 
women  worship  one  object — Margaret's  brother  Joe, 


AN  EX-COLLEGE    TUTOR.  387 

whom  they  are  sending  through  college  mainly  by  par 
ings  and  savings  from  their  own  personal  expenditure, 
making  the  old  gown  and  hat  do  another  season,  having 
the  old  boots  tapped  and  heeled  rather  than  buy  new, 
and  denying  themselves  in  a  thousand  ways  for  Joe's 
sake. 

It  was  just  when  they  were  in  this  pinch  of  saving  for 
Joe  that  having  a  spare  room  at  their  disposal,  it  was 
proposed  to  them  to  take  a  boarder  for  one  season,  a 
thing  they  had  never  thought  of  doing  before,  and  would 
not  now,  perhaps,  except  for  Miss  Elmore's  great  respect 
for  science,  her  high  ideal  of  men  who  pursue  such  call 
ings,  and  the  desire  to  turn  a  genteel  penny  for  the  stu 
dent  Joe's  sake.  The  person  who  engaged  her  spare 
chamber,  with  all  its  pretty  little  fripperies  and  lady-like 
adornments,  was  a  man  who  had  been  favorably  recom 
mended  ;  to  wit,  Tully  Cicero  Oldham. 

Mr.  Oldham  was  very  deaf,  and  used  an  ear-trumpet 
with  a  long  flexible  tube,  which,  when  not  in  use, 
he  carried  curled  about  his  left  arm.  He  had  been 
a  college  tutor  until  his  increasing  deafness  made 
it  impossible  to  "  coach  "  and  "  cram  "  students,  and 
then  he  turned  scientific  specialist  and  devoted  most 
of  his  time  to  the  study  of  cryptogamic  botany,  and 
the  lowest  forms  of  vegetable  life,  known  as  smut, 
rust,  mold,  and  mildew.  When  he  set  up  his  micro 
scope  in  Miss  Elmore's  best  room  and  prepared  his 
little  slides  and  specimens,  she  felt  her  house  to  be  greatly 
honored,  and  mentally  bowed  down,  not  to  Tully  Old- 
ham,  who  was  by  no  means  imposing,  but  to  the  great 
kingdom  of  science  which  he  represented,  and  which 
looked  so  fascinating  and  beautiful  to  her  gentle, 
womanly  eyes. 

Oldham  was  a  small  man  who  went  buzzing  about  with 
a  springy  automatic  fussiness.  His  nose  and  large  ears 
had  a  frost-bitten  expression  even  in  summer-time,  and 


388  VILLAGE  PHOTCGRAPHS. 

his  short,  stubby  beard  made  him  look  rather  painfully 
hirsute.  The  look  of  frost-bite  perhaps  came  from  the 
fact  that  he  had  lived  for  years  in  bleak  college  rooms, 
and  to  save  fuel  in  cold  weather  had  often  sat  and  shiv 
ered,  working  with  his  hat  on,  done  up  in  two  sets  of 
underwear,  three  pairs  of  socks,  and  a  top  coat  over  all 
his  other  clothes.  He  wore  his  hat  indoors  to  keep  the 
bald  part  of  his  head  warm,  and  tore  little  square  bits 
out  of  his  worn-out  under  linen  for  pocket-handkerchiefs. 
As  he  could  not  hear  the  sound  of  his  own  voice,  his  con 
versation  was  pitched  in  a  very  high  key,  and  gave  the 
effect  of  a  stridulous  grasshopper.  Living  shut  within  a 
world  of  his  own,  Tully  Cicero  made  an  excellent  little 
mole-eyed  specialist.  But  in  all  practical  matters  he  was 
a  mere  baby.  He  was  suspicious  of  the  hearing  world, 
as  very  deaf  people  often  are,  and  apt  to  take  wild 
notions  into  his  head,  which  to  him  wore  the  sharp  out 
lines  of  reality,  although  they  might  be  as  impossible  and 
foundationless  as  a  nightmare.  Moreover,  he  was  egre- 
giously  conceited,  thinking  himself  a  handsome,  fascinat 
ing  person,  for  whom  the  fair  sex  had  a  special  weak 
ness.  He  knew,  in  fact,  very  little  about  women,  having 
had  but  infrequent  opportunities  for  enjoying  what  the 
old-fashioned  novelists  used  to  call  female  society,  but 
the  less  he  knew  the  more  he  considered  himself  a  poten 
tial,  if  not  an  actual,  charmer. 

Tully  C.  Oldham  was  a  great  authority  on  smut,  mold 
rust,  and  mildew.  Learned  men  corresponded  with  him, 
and  any  thing  he  took  hold  of,  no  matter  how  difficult, 
he  bored  into  like  a  wood  wrorm  into  heart  of  oak.  Thus 
he  came  with  a  glamour  around  him  in  the  eyes  of  good 
Miss  Elmore.  If  he  had  been  Huxley  or  Tyndall,  or  the 
great  Darwin  himself,  he  could  not  have  been  more 
gently  entreated. 

He  was  translated  at  once  from  the  discomforts  of 
college  lodgings  of  the  poorer  sort,  where  he  had  often 


A    CLOVER  PATCH.  3^9 

lived  on  crackers  and  tea  with  only  an  occasional  meat 
dinner,  into  this  soft,  warm  nest,  dainty,  delicate,  full 
of  the  breath  of  flowers  and  the  sweet  influence  of  two 
refined  women  who  had  never  taken  boarders,  and  were 
ready  to  get  down  on  their  knees  to  serve  him  for 
seven  dollars  a  week.  Miss  Elmore  carried  his  hot  water 
up  to  him  in  the  morning  with  her  own  hands,  and  set  it 
down  outside  his  door  as  if  it  had  been  a  bath  for  Bud 
dha.  Margaret  prepared  for  him  cream  toast,  dropped 
eggs,  and  delicious  coffee.  Miss  Elmore  in  her  soft  voice 
conversed  with  him  through  the  ear-trumpet  about  the 
dignity  of  science — how  it  expands  the  mind  of  the  devo 
tee,  just  as  if  smut,  mold,  etc.,  were  a  pursuit  fit  for  the 
gods.  Delicately,  coyly,  these  two  women  discovered 
that  Tally's  wardrobe  was  sadly  out  of  repair.  It  only 
raised  him  in  Miss  Elmore's  estimation,  for  when  a  man's 
head  is  knocking  about  among  the  stars  how  can  he  think 
of  dropped  shirt  buttons  or  holes  in  his  stockings  ?  Piously 
did  Miss  Elmore  darn  those  said  holes,  of  large  size  and 
numerous.  Meekly  did  she  sew  on  buttons  and  tapes. 
She  even  went  to  the  length  of  putting  a  new  braid  on 
his  black  coat,  and  cleaning  all  the  spots  away  from  its 
worn,  shiny  surface,  with  camphene  and  a  flannel  rag, 
just  as  she  would  have  done  for  her  boy  Joe. 

Tully  Cicero  had  fallen  into  a  clover  patch,  and  soon 
he  began  to  get  stout  and  to  feel  certain  shooting  pains 
of  youthful  impulse  he  had  not  felt  for  many  years.  He 
filled  his  soul  with  vain  imaginings,  peculiar  to  his  own 
special  kind  of  queerness.  Instead  of  making  him  thank 
ful  and  reverent,  all  this  beneficence  poured  out  upon 
him  by  two  charming  women  only  tended  to  puff  him  up 
and  feed  his  self-conceit. 

As  he  pondered  on  their  unfailing  care  and  kind 
ness,  their  gentle  unconscious  petting,  he  came  to  the 
conclusion  that  Miss  Elmore  was  dead  in  love  with 
him,  and  that  Margaret  was  pretty  far  gone  on  the 


39°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

same  road.  This  notion  was  firmly  fixed  in  his  mind 
after  much  watching  of  the  elder  lady's  gentle  placid  face 
out  of  the  corner  of  his  beady  black  eyes,  as  she  helped 
him  to  the  best  of  every  thing  at  the  table,  and  the  pa 
tience  with  which  she  talked  to  him  through  the  ear-trum 
pet  on  abstruse  scientific  subjects.  She  would  sometimes 
slip  a  vase  of  flowers  into  his  room  when  he  was  absent, 
.  thinking  that  a  botanist  must  be  fond  of  bloom  and  fra 
grance,  if  he  did  devote  his  days  and  nights  to  smut  and 
mold.  But  Tully  with  this  wild  idea  in  his  head  read 
the  language  of  flowers,  and  believed  that  he  saw  in 
these  innocent  little  nosegays  a  declaration  of  her  passion. 
He  was  immensely  flattered  and  went  out  and  bought  a 
bottle  of  bears'  grease  and  loaded  his  hair  with  it  until 
it  scented  the  whole  house.  He  studied  himself  before 
the  glass  by  the  half  hour,  trying  on  all  his  most  killing 
expressions,  and  getting  more  and  more  fascinated  with 
his  own  bewitching  charms.  But  Miss  Elmore  would  not 
secure  the  prize — no  pressed  wallflower  for  him  :  and 
that  she  might  find  it  out  gradually  without  any  sudden 
rending  shock,  he  began  ogling  Margaret  at  the  table, 
and  smiling  on  her  with  a  silliness  that  was  irresistibly 
comical. 

Margaret  looked  on  astonished.  She  had  come  entirely 
out  of  the  glamour  of  science  which  blinded  her  aunt,  and 
regarded  Tully,  apart  from  all  love-making,  as  rather  an 
objectionable  little  person,  but  now,  that  he  had  begun 
to  ogle  and  make  eyes,  she  at  first  suspected  he  had  gone 
mildly  mad.  Then  she  began  to  watch  him  with  the  frank 
eyes  of  a  wide-awake  girl.  She  noticed  that  now  he  always 
wore  a  white  field  Marguerite  in  the  lapel  of  that  coat  her 
aunt  Susan  had  new-bound  and  cleaned  with  camphene. 
When  he  thought  margaret  was  observing  him  he  would 
slyly  raise  his  hand  to  the  flower,  as  much  as  to  say  :  *'  I 
am  your  adorer  and  bond-slave  for  life." 

Miss  Elmore,  in  her  sweet  calm  and  benignity,  never 


"THE   ODIOUS  LITTLE    CREATURE."  391 

saw  any  of  this  telegraphing,  and  when  Margaret,  who 
was  amused,  though  hotly  indignant  at  the  little  man's 
impudence,  broke  out  in  revolt,  she  would  not,  for  a 
time,  believe  one  word  of  the  tale  she  had  to  tell. 
One  morning  her  niece  refused  to  bake  waffles  for 
Tully  when  he  came  down  late  to  breakfast,  and  made 
signals  to  her  with  his  ear-trumpet  to  let  the  old  lady 
go  away  while  they  remained.  Miss  Elmore  was  very 
much  surprised  at  Margaret's  behavior,  but  she  went  out 
into  the  kitchen  and  baked  the  waffles  herself,  and  came 
in  with  her  delicate  cheek  quite  rosed  from  the  heat  of 
the  fire,  and  served  him  with  the  utmost  politeness. 

"  Oh,  the  horrid,  odious  little  creature,"  cried  Margaret 
about  two  hours  later,  rushing  into  the  sitting-room 
where  her  aunt  sat  placidly  sewing.  "  He  is  making 
love  to  me,  auntie.  He  actually  squeezed  my  hand 
there  in  the  passage,  and  when  I  snatched  it  away  he 
stuck  out  his  ear-trumpet  for  me  to  say  something.  Oh, 
if  it  had  been  an  elephant's  trunk,  how  gladly  I  would 
have  run  a  big  pin  into  it." 

Miss  Elmore  sat  straight  up  in  her  chair,  and  looked 
as  shocked  and  humiliated  as  if  she  had  heard  that  the 
great  Darwin  had  tried  to  kiss  her  niece  in  a  dark  corner. 
It  seemed  immodest  to  entertain  such  a  notion  concern 
ing  a  man  of  science.  "  Margaret,  you  must  be  mistaken. 
You  know  he  is  so  deaf  he  can  not  be  expected  to  under 
stand  every  thing.  He  is  like  a  child  in  his  devotion  to 
science." 

"  If  he  is  deaf  he  understands  well  enough  how  to 
squeeze  hands.  And  as  for  his  childlike  character,  he  has 
been  making  eyes  at  me  behind  your  back  for  two  or 
three  weeks.  I  was  ashamed  to  say  any  thing  about  it. 
I  thought  perhaps  it  was  a  sudden  turn  like  crick  in  the 
back,  that  might  pass  off.  But  I  see  we  have  innocently 
been  too  kind  to  him,  and  have  put  the  wildest  notions 
into  his  horrid  little  mind.  I  suspect  he  thinks  we  are 


39 2  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS, 

both  in  love  with  him.  We  must  get  rid  of  him,  auntie, 
or  else  I  shall  telegraph  to  Joe  to  come  home." 

It  was  a  long  time  before  Margaret  could  open  her 
aunt's  eyes  to  the  fact  that  the  little  "  scientific  gent  " 
had  something  smutty  in  his  nature.  But  when  she 
began  to  watch  him,  a  thing  her  high-mindedness  ren 
dered  very  painful,  she  was  convinced  of  the  truth. 
She  had  borne  all  his  disagreeable  little  habits  with  divine 
patience,  and  now  she  grieved  to  find  that  science  does 
not  always  ennoble  its  devotees.  She  tried  to  devise 
measures  for  getting  him  quietly  out  of  the  house,  but 
before  these  could  be  perfected  he  had  proposed  to  Mar 
garet  in  the  garden  where  she  was  watering  her  plants. 
He  had  kneeled  right  down  in  a  particularly  damp  place, 
regardless  of  his  trowsers,  and  had  seized  hold  of  her 
dress  and  poured  out  a  wild  profession  of  love  in  his 
high-pitched  voice,  and  then  he  had  reached  her  the  ear- 
trumpet.  Oh,  the  horror  of  having  to  refuse  a  man 
through  an  ear-trumpet,  who  is  kneeling  before  you  in 
the  garden,  right  in  the  face  and  eyes  of  all  the  world  ! 
"  Get  up,"  she  cried,  severely,  "  get  right  up  off  your 
knees  this  minute."  The  ridiculous  man  arose  rather 
sheepishly.  "  Now  go  and  pack  your  trunk  right  away, 
and  leave  this  house  within  an  hour.  '  You  are  utterly 
and  totally  mistaken.  You  have  got  an  entirely  false 
impression.  Now  don't  be  foolish  anol  absurd,  but  go 
away  quietly." 

"  I  am  not  going  away,"  returned  Tully,  his  small  eyes 
glinting  with  defiance.  "  I  have  paid  my  board  a  week  in 
advance,  and  I  am  going  to  stay.  I  have  been  en 
couraged  here  in  this  house  in  a  way  that  gives  me  a  legal 
hold.  Your  aunt  has  made  as  good  as  open  proposals 
to  me,  and  you  have  both  tried  to  throw  yourselves  at 
my  head." 

"You  shameless,  abandoned  man  !"  cried  Margaret, 
seizing  the  tube.  "You  know  you  are  telling  -lies;  -I; 


"I'M  AFRAID  HE'S   GONE   CRAZY."  393 

shall  go  and  pack  your  trunk  myself,  and  put  your  board 
money  in  it,  and  then  you  must  leave  this  house.  We 
shall  not  give  you  another  meal." 

They  were  just  in  the  midst  of  this  excited  colloquy, 
Margaret  pouring  her  strong  words  into  the  end  of  the 
ear-trumpet,  and  Tully  vociferating  at  the  same  time, 
when  Miss  Elmore,  hearing  voices  raised,  came  out  on 
the  porch  with  a  scared  look. 

"  Auntie,"  cried  her  niece,  half  choked  with  wrath, 
"  he  is  a  dreadful,  bad  man.  He  says  he  won't  leave  the 
house.  He  says  we  both  of  us  encouraged  him  to  think 
that  one  or  both  of  us  would  marry  him,  and  he  is  going 
to  sue  for  breach  of  promise.  Oh,  auntie,  what  shall  we 
do?" 

Miss  Elmore's  face  grew  very  white.  "  Margaret," 
she  whispered,  forgetting  he  could  not  hear,  "  I  am  afraid 
he's  gone  suddenly  crazy.  Let  us  try  to  slip  into  the 
house  and  lock  him  out." 

They  both  rushed  upon  the  doorway,  and  in  an  instant 
the  key  was  grating  in  the  lock.  They  flew  all  over  the 
house  bolting,  and  barring,  and  fastening  windows.  And 
when  the  angry  Tully  began  to  knock  and  shake  the 
door  for  admission  he  found  the  lockout  complete.  The 
shades  were  all  drawn  down,  and  the  house  looked  as  if 
a  death  had  occurred  in  the  family.  After  prowling 
about  the  kitchen  and  back  entrance  for  some  time,  Tully 
took  up  his  position  opposite,  where  a  vacant  lot  was 
bounded  by  a  stone  wall.  He  seated  himself  on  the  wall 
prepared  to  watch  the  house  over  the  way  with  a  view  to 
slipping  in  and  barricading  himself  in  his  own  room 
should  an  opportunity  occur.  He  had  by  no  means 
given  up  the  fight,  and  if  he  could  not  win  the  day  he 
could  at  least  annoy  and  torment  two  unprotected  fe 
males.  Tully  was  as  full  of  spite  as  an  egg  is  of  meat. 

There  he  sat  all  the  afternoon  gazing  at  the  closed 
house.  Occasionally.  Margaret  would  peep  out  of  some- 


394  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

crack  in  the  blind  to  see  if  he  were  still  visible,  and 
there  he  was  perched  up  like  an  ugly  little  idol  on  the 
wall. 

"  I  can't  stand  it,"  cried  Margaret,  passionately  ;  "  it 
is  worse  than  a  boycott.  We  shall  have  to  telegraph  in 
some  way  for  Joe." 

They  had  carefully  packed  Tully's  trunk  and  cau 
tiously  shoved  it  out  on  the  porch,  instantly  locking  the 
door  again  for  fear  of  consequences.  Miss  Elmore  car 
ried  the  microscope  down  in  its  case  and  set  it  on  the 
trunk  cover,  while  Margaret  stood  guard  behind  her  with 
a  poker  in  her  hand. 

"  We  never  can  endure  life,"  the  girl  cried,  "  with  that 
man  watching  us.  Stop,  I  have  a  happy  thought."  She 
ran  to  the  writing-desk  and  scribbled  a  hasty  note  ;  then 
she  beckoned  to  a  neighbor's  boy,  who  was  flying  his 
kite  in  the  next  yard,  and  threw  it  to  him  out  of  the  back 
window.  The  lad  took  the  note  and  disappeared  on  a 
run  down  the  street.  In  about  an  hour  Dr.  John  Riv- 
ington  came  striding  down  past  the  Elmore  house  with 
his  thick  stick  in  his  hand.  He  came  up  to  the  place 
where  Tully  Cicero  sat  perched  on  the  wall,  and  the  little 
man  of  rust  and  mold  began  to  quail.  The  doctor 
lifted  him  down  from  his  roosting  place  not  ungently. 
Then  taking  him  by  the  coat-collar  much  as  a  big  dog 
takes  a  little  one  by  the  ''scruff"  of  his  neck,  he  gave 
him  a  shake. 

"  You  miserable  little  wretch,"  cried  the  doctor,  "  to 
insult  and  terrify  ladies  who  have  been  kind  to  you. 
You  are  too  small  to  kick  or  I  would  send  you  into  the 
middle  of  next  week.  Go  on  there,  march  before,  and 
get  a  man  to  come  for  your  trunk  yonder,  and  take 
yourself  out  of  this  town  in  less  than  two  hours." 

Tully  heard  not  a  word  the  doctor  said,  but  he  under 
stood  him  well  enough,  and  the  next  train  took  him  and 
his  belongings  out  of  the  village.  He  has  written  Miss 


A    PENITENT  LETTER. 


395 


Elmore  an  abject,  penitent  letter,  begging  her  forgive 
ness  ;  and  now  she  can  laugh  about  it  a  little,  though 
for  a  long  time  it  looked  to  her  very  dreadful  and  com 
promising. 


CHAPTER   XLI. 

STRANGE    DISTURBANCES    AT    STILLWELL's. 

SNUG  and  cheery  looks  the  home  when  the  nights  are 
growing  darker  and  longer.  The  piazza-chairs  are 
deserted,  the  hammock  is  put  away  in  the  attic.  The 
hens  will  no  longer  roost  in  the  trees,  they  take  up  win 
ter  quarters  in  the  barn.  The  cat  comes  purring  in 
around  your  feet  as  you  sit  in  your  favorite  corner  with 
lamp  and  book,  and  the  house-do^  is  no  longer  content  to 
lie  on  the  outside  mat.  This  is  the  time  when  human  beings 
begin  to  draw  closer  together,  when  they  tell  old  stories, 
and  recall  the  past  around  the  evening  fire  ;  when  the 
young  girl  touches  the  piano  in  the  twilight,  and  sings 
some  snatch  of  ballad  music  that  is  running  in  her  head. 
The  very  street  looks  as  if  there  was  little  to  expect  now 
from  gardens  and  trees,  human  interests  having  come 
uppermost. 

The  few  small  shops  wear  a  more, inviting  air.  People 
begin  to  drop  in  again  to  chat  with  the  old  shoe 
maker,  who  has  just  been  reading  Schopenhauer  and  the 
translation  of  another  German  work  called  "  Kraft  und 
Stoff."  He  shakes  his  head  and  says  he  don't  think  they 
make  as  good  philosophical  waxed-ends  as  Aristotle  and 
some  of  those  old  fellows,  who  are  still  way  out  of  sight 
of  the  moderns.  The  post-office  and  the  grocery  store 
have  again  become  resorts,  and  the  apothecary's  shop 
looks  very  pleasant,  with  its  colored  glasses,  bright  lamps, 
and  clean  panes.  It  is  a  neat  little  place,  shining  with 
new  paint,  and  a  neat  little  man  presides  over  it.  There 
is  a  gloss  on  his  linen,  a  minute  attention  to  his  clothes, 
a  delicate  perfume  about  him,  like  some  highly  scented 


HE  ADMIRED  HIS    WIFE.  397 

expensive  soap,  that  might  lead  you  to  think  Andrew 
Stiliwell  a  fussy,  prim  old  bachelor.  But  in  truth  he  is 
very  much  of  a  family  man.  He  glides  around  the  shop 
with  unsqueaking  shoes,  and  deals  out  hair-oil,  tooth 
brushes,  bathing  sponges  and  patent  medicines.  He  puts 
up  his  prescriptions,  which  are  not  very  numerous  unless 
there  happens  to  be  an  epidemic  of  scarlet  fever  or  diph 
theria,  with  a  neatness  which  would  do  credit  to  a  city 
pharmacist. 

Every  thing  was  apparently  very  happy  in  his  home  at 
the  time  those  strange  disturbances  first  began  to  be 
talked  of.  The  little  druggist's  ruling  passion  was  ad 
miration  for  his  wife.  He  was  so  grateful  to  her  for 
marrying  him,  the  sense  of  her  great  condescension  kept 
him  humble-minded.  He  never  concluded  the  smallest 
business  transaction  without  saying  "  I  must  first  con 
sult  my  wife.  She  has  an  excellent  head  for  business 
and  has  often  given  me  points."  As  to  the  control  of 
his  family  of  five  children,  that  was  all  left  to  Mrs.  Still- 
well.  It  was  her  part  to  do  the  governing  aud  correct 
ing,  the  spanking  and  admonishing.  He  played  with  his 
children  and  indulged  them  in  small  ways,  but  he  did 
not  think  himself  equal  to  the  real  bringing  up.  That 
was  left  to  the  very  superior  woman  who  had  stooped  to 
marry  him.  Mrs.  Stiliwell  was  half  a  head  taller  than  her 
mate.  The  eldest  boy,  Theo,  was  now  taller  than  his 
father,  whom  the  children  looked  on  as  about  on  their 
level,  and  loved  as  one  of  themselves,  a  person  they 
could  do  with  pretty  much  as  they  pleased,  while  the 
mother,  an  intellectual  woman,  was  too  clear-sighted  to 
be  deceived,  and  was  therefore  thoroughly  respected  and 
even  feared. 

There  is  a  thorn  in  every  body's  pillow,  and  the  thorn 
that  pierced  Andrew  was  the  fact  that  Mrs.  Andrew  had 
loved  another  man  before  she  condescended  to  marry  the 
village  druggist.  She  belonged  to  an  excellent  village 


398  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

family  of  some  wealth,  while  Andrew  had  sprung  kom 
little  tenant  farmers  of  no  consequence.  Mary  Spear's 
early  love  story  was  pathetic  and  even  beautiful,  and  was 
laid  up  in  lavender  there  in  the  village  archives  among 
those  odds  and  ends  of  actual  romance  that  are  always 
stranger  than  fiction.  She  had  been  engaged,  when  a 
tall,  handsome,  resolute  young  girl,  to  Mrs.  Macy's 
eldest  son  by  her  first  husband,  and  soon  after  the  war  of 
the  rebellion  broke  out  he,  Ralph  Freeman,  had  joined 
the  Union  army  and  marched  to  the  front.  Just  pre 
vious  to  his  departure  the  lovers  had  quarreled,  and  both 
of  them  being  proud  and  obstinate,  no  reconciliation  had 
taken  place  when  Ralph  left  the  village  with  his  regi 
ment.  He  was  soon  ordered  away  to  join  the  army  of 
the  Potomac. 

It  was  more  than  two  years  later  that  Mary  Spear 
joined  a  corps  of  nurses  to  go  and  do  duty  in  the 
field  hospitals  after  the  battle  of  Antietam.  She  went 
under  the  charge  of  a  member  of  the  sanitary  commis 
sion,  who  was  placed  at  the  head  of  the  little  expedi 
tion,  and  they  carried  with  them  medical  stores  and  a 
great  quantity  of  lint  and  bandages  made  by  the  village 
women,  besides  several  hundred  flannel  shirts  and  socks 
which  the  First  Church  Sewing  Society  had  contributed. 
For  a  year  these  women  went  wherever  they  were  ordered 
in  the  field,  to  minister  to  the  sick  and  dying  ;  they  were 
always,  it  seemed,  in  the  immediate  wake  of  battle,  and 
Mary  Spear  saw  scenes  of  anguish  and  blood  in  those 
days  which  have  left  an  indelible  mark  on  her  life. 

It  was  just  before  Gettysburg  that  a  few  men  on 
stretchers  were  brought  into  the  tent  hospital,  terribly 
wounded  while  on  a  reconnoissance,  by  a  shell  from  a 
masked  battery.  Ralph  Freeman  was  among  the  mortally 
hurt.  A  fragment  of  the  shell  had  torn  its  way  through 
his  body,  and  he  was  bleeding  to  death.  But  he  was  still 
conscious.  He  knew  Mary  Spear.  He  could  even  speak 


SACRED  KEEPSAKES.  399 

a  little  in  whispers,  and  at  last  he  died  in  her  arms.  When 
Mary  came  home  from  that  hospital  campaign,  she  had 
grown  into  a  woman,  strong  and  serious,  through  a  vari 
ety  of  terrible  experiences.  Why  did  she  a  few  years  later 
marry  little  Andrew  Stillwell  ?  Why  do  thousands  of  such 
women  in  narrow  spheres  marry  men  inferior  to  them 
selves  ?  Dog-like  devotion,  the  kind  of  worship  such 
humble,  good,  self-abnegating  souls  give  to  noblewomen, 
often  finds  its  recompense,  and  love  makes  all  incongru 
ity  to  drop  away  and  disappear,  especially  if  the  devo 
tion  of  the  lesser  one  asks  little  for  itself  but  kind 
tolerance. 

Mary  Spear  brought  home  with  her  a  few  sacred  keep 
sakes  Ralph  had  given  her  at  the  last.  She  did  not  show 
them  even  to  his  mother,  and  her  husband,  though  he 
knew  she  possessed  such  things,  had  never  seen  them. 
They  were  kept  with  Ralph's  picture  and  his  old  letters. 
He  knew  Mary  put  flowers  on  Freeman's  grave  every 
Memorial  Day.  Each  time  he  passed  from  his  little  shop 
to  his  own  house  his  eye  rested  on  the  small  and  rather 
ugly  monument  the  towns-people  had  put  up  to  the 
memory  of  their  dead  soldiers.  On  the  principal  face  of 

it  was  written  :  "  Ralph  Freeman,  Colonel  of  the  

Regiment.  Killed  on  the  field  of  battle  !  Oh,  sweet  is 
it  to  die  for  one's  country."  People  said  that  Mary  re 
fused  Stillwell  twelve  times,  but  she  became  Mrs.  Still- 
well  in  the  end,  and  the  mother  of  a  fine  family  of  chil 
dren.  What  will  not  lovers'  assiduity  accomplish  ?  Sam 
Blake  proposed  to  Tilly  Jones  over  a  score  of  times,  and 
the  story  is  told  that  after  she  had  refused  him  repeatedly 
she  saw  him  open  the  front  door  one  day  while  she  was 
at  the  top  of  the  stairs,  and  she  called  out,  "  You  needn't 
come  in,  Sam  ;  I  will  not  have  you."  But  she  did  have 
him,  finally,  and  is  now  Mrs.  Sam  Blake,  just  as  Mary 
Spear  is  Mrs.  Andrew  Stillwell. 

There  was  that  skeleton  in  Stillwell's  closet — the  sol- 


400  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS, 

diers'  monument,  the  grave  on  the  hill,  the  love-letters 
and  keepsakes  his  wife  keeps  locked  away,  reserving  a 
compartment  in  her  heart  for  the  dead  Ralph.  To  be 
sure  he  married  her  when  she  told  him  her  heart  was 
buried  in  the  grave,  but  all  these  years  he  has  had  an 
aching  and  longing  in  his  breast  for  the  love  of  his  wife, 
something  more  than  duty  love  ;  and  though  he  has  tried 
to  ennoble  himself  and  to  rise  above  jealousy  of  the  dead, 
it  is  hard,  nay,  impossible  of  accomplishment.  Mary 
Stillwell's  story  was  well  known  in  the  village,  but  of 
course  her  children  were  entirely  ignorant  of  it.  The 
name  of  Ralph  Freeman  was  never  heard  in  that  house, 
but  the  memory  of  him  was  always  in  the. mother's  heart, 
and  it  was  like  grit  in  the  eyes  of  Andrew.  The  village 
gossips  sometimes  raked  up  her  pathetic  little  story  out 
of  the  ashes  of  the  past  and  rubbed  it  bright  again. 

No  one  could  say  truthfully  that  Mary  was  not  happy 
in  her  family  of  three  boys  and  two  girls,  all  going  to 
school  now.  They  are  fine,  noble-looking  children. 
People  said  there  was  not  much  Stillwell  about  them ; 
they  featured  the  Spears.  Good  little  scholars  they  were, 
eager  and  ambitious,  and  still  with  an  insatiable  appetite 
for  fun  and  play. 

You  should  have  seen  them  of  an  evening  gathered 
around  the  table  in  the  dining-room,  with  the  hanging- 
lamp  casting  down  its  light  on  the  brown-golden 
heads  :  the  oldest  boy,  a  lad  of  sixteen,  preparing  for 
college  ;  Mary,  the  mother — with  her  dark  keen  eyes 
and  handsome  face,  the  hair  showing  steely  lines  in  the 
brown  braids — helping  him  with  his  algebra  and  his  Latin, 
studying  beside  him  that  she  might  help  him  more  effec 
tually  ;  the  younger  boys  with  their  grammars  and  phrase- 
books  spread  out  to  parse  with  mother  ;  the  two  little 
girls,  eight  and  ten,  the  youngest  golden-haired,  with 
great  blue  eyes,  busy  with  their  slates  and  pencils,  to  show 
writing  and  summing  and  spelling  all  to  mother.  She 


THE  NEXT-DOOR  NEIGHBOR.  4° I 

had  called  her  eldest  boy  Theodore,  gift  of  God,  and  per 
haps  there  was  an  implied  sense  of  joy  and  consolation 
in  that  name  no  one  knew  but  herself.  The  frank-eyed 
lad,  so  honest  and  true-hearted  and  manly,  was  Mary's 
mainstay.  If  any  thing  should  happen  to  Andrew  before 
the  children  were  fully  grown,  there  was  Theo  to  take  a 
father's  place. 

The  Stilhvells  were  not  very  well  off.  Mary  had 
brought  a  little  money  in  her  hand,  which  was  spent  in 
buying  and  furnishing  the  house.  This  house  was  of  the 
basement-kitchen  variety,  built  upon  a  gentle  slope,  with  a 
terraced  side-hill  garden  and  a  small  yard  in  front  for 
flowers.  During  the  evening  the  kitchen  part  was  gener 
ally  deserted,  as  the  maid  of  all  work  often  went  home  to 
sleep.  The  entrance  to  the  sitting-room  was  at  the  side, 
up  a  steep  bit  of  path  from  the  village  street,  bordered 
with  rose-bushes  and  flowering  shrubs.  Next  door  to 
the  Stilhvells  lived  Stephen,  the  taxidermist.  Only  a  low 
picket-fence  separated  his  garden  from  theirs.  Stephen 
had  often  thrown  sticks  and  stones  and  brick-bats  into 
their  yard  on  pretense  that  the  Stillwell  children  were 
trespassing  on  his  ground. 

Many  months  had  passed  since  Mary  had  spoken 
to  her  surly  neighbor  or  paid  the  least  attention 
to  his  pranks.  She  had  taken  the  side  of  Stephen's 
mother  in  the  trouble  between  them,  when  the  son 
was  so  unkind  and  cruel,  after  the  loss  of  his  money, 
and  he  and  the  Stilhvells  were  now  at  daggers  drawn. 
Stephen  had  killed  two  of  the  little  girls'  kittens,  and 
thrown  them  over  the  fence.  If  one  of  the  boys  tossed 
a  ball  by  accident  on  his  ground,  they  did  not  dare  to  go 
and  look  for  it  for  fear  of  a  stoning.  The  children  were 
remarkably  good  and  obedient ;  their  mother  saw  that 
they  never  interfered  with  the  neighbors.  But  Stephen 
had  a  special  grudge  against  the  druggist.  He  had 
ordered  from  him  a  quantity  of  crude  drugs  and  chemi- 


4° 2  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

cals  used  in  his  craft,  and  then  had  refused  to  pay  the 
price  agreed  upon.  Stillwell  had  brought  suit  against 
him  to  recover  the  money,  and  the  matter  was  as  yet 
unsettled.  Stephen  was  away  from  home  when  the  dis 
turbances  began  at  the  Stillwells',  and  his  house  was 
closed.  His  mother  was  living  with  her  sister  on  suffer 
ance  because  she  dared  not  go  to  her  own  home,  where 
her  son  burrowed  like  a  brigand  in  a  cave. 

Something  was  certainly  going  wrong  at  the  Stillwells' 
and  though  the  family  were  very  close-mouthed  about  it, 
and  would  not  admit  that  it  could  not  all  be  traced  to 
natural  causes,  it  created  an  undercurrent  of  excitement 
in  the  village.  Rats  in  the  cellar  that  had  come  up 
through  the  drain,  was  the  first  explanation,  but  the 
noises  were  not  at  all  like  those  made  by  rats,  and  twice 
there  had  been  an  alarm  raised  late  in  the  evening  that 
the  Stillwell  house  was  on  fire.  A  red  glare  had  been 
seen  to  burst  out  of  one  of  the  lower  windows  after  the 
family  were  in  bed,  but  when  the  alarm  was  given  and 
search  was  made  nothing  could  be  found.  The  noises 
were  said  to  be  like  those  made  by  hogsheads  and  fifty- 
pound  weights  rolled  about  in  the  cellar.  Shots  had  also 
been  fired,  and  occasionally  the  mournful  sound  of  a 
muffled  drum  filled  every  part  of  the  house.  Most  of 
these  disturbances  occurred  in  the  middle  of  the  night, 
but  two  or  three  times  in  the  daylight  a  shower  of  broken 
glass  and  pebbles  had  fallen  on  the  roof. 

When  the  cause  of  these  mysterious  persecutions  had 
eluded  discovery  for  a  few  days,  Stillwell  put  the  case 
into  the  hands  of  the  constable  and  other  village  author 
ities,  but  he  repelled  all  neighborly  peeping  and  prying. 
A  great  change  had  taken  place  in  the  neat,  alert  little 
man.  His  cheeks  looked  flabby  and  livid.  He  was  hag 
gard  and  his  jaw  dropped  every  time  the  trouble  in  his 
house  was  mentioned.  He  had  grown  careless  about  his 
dress.  His  linen  cuffs  were  spotted  with  the  medicines 


"HE   KNOCKS  IN   THE  CHIMNEY."  4°3 

he  compounded  with  shaking  hands.  But  he  politely 
requested  the  neighbors  to  keep  cool  and  leave  him  to 
deal  with  the  mysteries  which  he  did  not  attempt  to  deny 
had  broken  out  in  his  house.  But  the  more  silent  and 
reserved  and  nervous  the  family  became  the  more  the 
people  whispered  together. 

"  What  do  you  suppose  they  want  at  the  Stillwells'  ?  " 
said  Mrs.  John  Dean  in  an  awed  voice  to  Mrs.  Deacon 
Hildreth,  as  the  two  ladies  happened  to  meet  on  First 
Church  corner. 

"  It  ain't  no  they  at  all,"  returned  stout  Mrs.  Hildreth, 
puffing  a  little  from  exercise  (she  had  never  parsed  Mil 
ton's  "  Paradise  Lost "  all  through).  "It's  a  he,  Mrs. 
Dean — no  other  than  Ralph  Freeman,  him  Mary  Still- 
well  was  engaged  to  years  and  years  ago,  and  who  you 
know  got  killed  in  the  war.  They  do  say  he  knocks  in 
the  chimney  and  all  over  the  house  and  cries,  *  Mary, 
Mary,'  waking  her  out  of  her  sleep  with  a  deep  groan  to 
see  his  name, '  Ralph,'  in  red,  fiery  letters  on  the  wall. 
They  think  Stillwell  will  go  crazy,  for  he  always  has  been 
jealous  of  Ralph  Freeman,  though  the  poor  fellow  was 
put  under  ground  so  long  ago.  But  Mary  gets  angry  if 
any  one  pretends  to  say  it  really  is  Ralph.  She  says 
malice  is  at  the  bottom  of  it,  either  malice  of  this  world 
or  the  other,  and  she  presumes  of  this.  It's  an  awful 
cruel  trick  if  it  is  a  trick,  but  you  know  the  spiritualists 
in  town  are  all  up  in  arms.  There's  an  old  ice-house 
made  in  the  side-hill,  and  attached  to  the  cellar.  It  was 
built  on  by  Aaron  Holmes  when  he  lived  there,  but  the 
Stillwells  never  have  used  it.  They  say  the  worst  of  the 
noises  come  from  that  old  house.  And  the  other  night 
when  the  two  oldest  Stillwell  boys  tried  to  get  in  there, 
the  door  was  held  against  them,  and  green  fire  and  a  bad 
smell  of  brimstone  broke  out  all  around  the  cracks. 
Mary  has  sent  the  little  girls  and  the  youngest  boy  away 
to  her  sisters.  She  savs  she  means  to  hold  the  fort. 


404  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

She's  right  down  plucky,  but  Stillwell  is  all  broken 
up." 

"  Dear  me,  I  should  like  to  see  it,"  said  Mrs.  Dean,  in 
a  delightful  state  of  goose-flesh  and  shivers. 

"  They  won't  let  nobody  come  to  the  house,  and  the 
constable  has  orders  to  arrest  prowlers." 

There  was  enough  truth  mixed  up  with  the  stories 
floating  all  over  the  village  to  make  the  Stillwell  family 
miserable.  The  mother  was  more  courageous  than  any 
of  the  others.  She  had  a  theory  that  if  the  noises  were 
inexplicable  they  would  soon  die  away  of  themselves  ;  if 
not,  the  truth  would  sometime  be  discovered.  Still  her 
heart  was  torn  with  old  memories,  and  the  cruel  ordeal 
seemed  often  too  hard  to  bear.  After  the  boys  had  been 
frightened  by  green  fire  and  brimstone,  the  old  ice-house, 
called  in  the  family  the  Black  Hole  of  Calcutta,  was 
thoroughly  ransacked.  The  door  was  found  ajar,  and 
the  place  was  quite  empty.  Apparently  there  was  no 
communication  between  the  Black  Hole  and  the  cellar. 
A  solid,  rough  stone-wall  met  the  hand  and  the  eye  on 
all  sides.  The  knocks  were  of  a  deep  subterranean 
sound,  and  when  tried  by  the  alphabet  invariably  spelled 
out  "  Ralph  Free  " — and  then  stopped.  One  night  Still- 
well  and  his  wife  were  alone  together  in  the  house,  the 
boys  having  gone  off  to  sleep  with  a  young  friend,  Abner 
Smith,  in  order  to  get  a  little  rest.  Poor  Stillwell  had 
lost  appetite  and  color,  and  his  flesh  was  fast  falling  off. 
He  had  always  deplored  the  influence  of  Ralph  Freeman's 
memory  on  the  mind  of  his  wife,  and  this  trouble  seemed 
to  have  come  as  the  realization  of  an  ill-defined  dread 
that  had  lain  in  his  mind  for  years.  To  have  Ralph 
haunting  his  house  (for  in  his  weakened  state  he  had 
come  over  to  a  belief  in  the  miraculous)  he  felt  would 
kill  him. 

"  Why  do  you  think  he  comes  back  to  torture  us  in 
this  way,  Mary  ?  "  he  asked,  taking  his  head  in  his  hands. 


A    SAD  AND    TENDER  MEMORY.  4°5 

"  He  does  not  come  back  thus,"  she  answered  indig 
nantly,  "  if  he  comes  at  all.  He  was  a  good,  generous, 
whole-hearted  man.  Do  you  suppose  he  wishes  to  spoil 
our  lives  ?  It  is  most  unkind  to  think  it.  There  is  some 
devilish  work  going  on  here,  but  it  does  not  proceed 
from  Ralph  Freeman." 

Andrew  groaned.  He  had  often  longed  to  talk  to  his 
wife  about  his  jealousy  of  the  dead,  but  he  had  never 
found  courage  to  speak  Ralph's  name.  Now  he 
trembled  as  the  daring  words  came  to  his  lips.  "  Mary," 
said  he  faintly,  "did  you  not  once  tell  me  that  your  heart 
was  buried  in  his  coffin  ?  " 

"  Perhaps  I  did  years  ago,  when  the  grief  and  sense  of 
loss  were  fresh  and  keen,  but  to-day  he  is  only  a  sad  and 
tender  memory,  I  am  heart-bound  to  my  husband  and 
children.  You  have  made  my  life  so  good  and  so  sweet, 
Andrew,  I  have  no  time  now  for  vain  regrets.  I  love  you 
just  as  a  wife  should  love  her  faithful,  devoted  husband." 

Andrew  felt  his  wife's  words  fall  like  drops  of  dew  on 
his  fever-parched  heart.  The  real  specter  had  been  all 
the  time  pent  up  in  his  breast,  and  he  never  had  found 
the  strength  to  exorcise  it  by  speaking  frankly  to  his  wife. 
And  here  in  a  moment  she  had  made  all  clear  and  shining 
like  the  noonday.  They  had  it  all  out  that  night — the 
perfect  explanation  of  every  thing— the  good  talk,  that 
makes  the  heart  feel  light.  Andrew  discovered  that 
there  is  a  soul  of  good  in  things  evil.  If  Ralph  Free 
man  was  haunting  his  house  to  spite  him  for  marrying 
Mary,  he  had  made  an  egregious  blunder.  Andrew  slept 
soundly  for  the  first  time  in  a  week,  and  arose  next 
morning  a  new  man. 

The  constable  and  his  deputy,  our  one  policeman,  had 
watched  the  house  two  or  three  nights  without  discover 
ing  the  cause  of  the  mysterious  rappings  and  other 
noises.  Suddenly  they  all  ceased,  the  officers  went  away 
to  their  warm  beds,  the  excitement  in  the  village  quieted 


4°6  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

down,  and  vigilance  relaxed.  The  lad  Abner  Smith, 
friend  of  the  Stillwell  boys,  had  a  natural  talent  for  what 
is  called  in  country  phrase  snooping.  Abner  had  made 
up  his  mind  to  do  a  little  bit  of  amateur  detective  work 
on  his  own  account.  About  this  time  Stephen  returned 
from  his  journey,  and  was  seen  busy  about  his  garden. 
Abner  took  to  haunting  the  old  ice-house,  and  spent  a 
long  time  in  examining  the  apparently  dead  wall.  At 
last  to  his  joy  and  surprise  he  discovered  two  loosened 
stones  in  the  foundation,  which  could  easily  be  displaced 
and  gave  direct  access  to  the  Stillwell  cellar.  There  was 
a  great  air  of  mystery  about  the  house  after  this,  although 
the  noises  and  disturbances  had  entirely  ceased.  The 
boys  were  always  consulting  together  after  dark,  and 
carried  on  some  kind  of  work  in  the  cellar  which  they 
concealed  from  the  household. 

It  happened  to  be  All  Hallow  Eve.  Mary  spoke  of  it 
to  Andrew,  and  said  laughingly  that  "  the  spooks  would 
be  sure  to  visit  them  again  on  that  witch-haunted  night." 
The  boys  had  made  their  own  plans,  and  with  matches 
and  a  dark  lantern  they  had  determined  to  watch  in  the 
large  coal-bin  down  cellar.  It  was  the  witching  hour 
after  midnight,  when  darkness  and  silence  brooded  over 
the  whole  village.  A  spectral  white  figure  seemed  to 
rise  up  from  the  ground  and  then  to  sink  away  suddenly 
beneath  the  earth.  In  a  moment  there  came  up  out  of 
the  Black  Hole  of  Calcutta,  not  a  groan,  but  a  prolonged 
ear-piercing  yell.  The  boys  put  a  match  to  the  dark  lan 
tern,  and  ran  to  the  hole  in  the  wall,  nearly  falling  over 
each  other  in  their  haste  and  eagerness.  Then  such  a 
turmoil  of  shouts,  such  a  babel  of  voices  arose  from  the 
lower  regions,  that  Stillwell  awoke  in  fright,  donned  a 
hasty  garment,  and  took  a  candle  in  his  hand.  Mary, 
quite  pale,  followed  in  her  night-cap  and  wrapper.  She 
had  no  belief  in  spooks  or  rapping  spirits,  but  it  was  All 
Hallow  E'en.  They  crept  down  the  stairs,  and  soon 


THE  NIP   OF   THE  STEEL    TRAP.  4° 7 

recognized  Theodore's  voice  shouting  and  vocifer 
ating. 

"  We've  got  him,  mother.  The  spook  is  bagged."  On 
the  basement  floor,  where  they  had  dragged  him,  lay  a 
long  limp  object,  done  up  in  a  white  sheet.  "  He's  try 
ing  to  play  'possum,  to  make  out  he's  a  sleep-walker," 
remarked  Ab  Smith,  with  the  coolness  of  an  old  hand  ; 
"  the  nip  of  that  big  steel-trap  took  him  right  through  the 
foot." 

Andrew  Stillwell  bent  down  and  allowed  the  light  of 
his  candle  to  fall  on  the  prostrate  form.  It  was  his 
neighbor  Stephen,  who  had  hidden  day-times  in  his  own 
house  for  a  fortnight,  and  had  spent  his  nights  in  the 
unhallowed  work  of  making  life  unendurable  to  the  Still- 
wells',  out  of  pure  spite.  Stephen  had  got  in  by  the 
Black  Hole,  had  displaced  the  stones  in  the  cellar  wall, 
and  played  spook  and  spirit-rapper  with  phosphorus, 
colored  fire,  sulphur,  and  an  old  bass  drum  purchased 
from  a  member  of  a  strolling  band.  He  had  also  con 
trived  a  sort  of  catapult  to  throw  small  stones  from  the 
top  of  the  hill.  It  was  first  proposed  to  dress  Stephen  in 
a  suit  of  tar  and  feathers,  but  Mary  Stillwell  intervened 
and  made  him  buy  his  safety  by  signing  a  paper  promis 
ing  to  do  justice  to  his  mother.  The  old  lady  has  come 
home,  and  Stephen  is  now  away  in  the  South  for  his 
health.  Indirectly  those  mysterious  disturbances  at  the 
Stillwells',  which  the  village  spiritualists  so  exaggerated, 
have  resulted  in  good  to  several  people. 


CHAPTER    XLII. 

BROTHER      GEORGE. 

A  MONG  the  most  deeply-rooted  of  all  rural  ideas  is 
/I  the  dislike  of  paying  debts.  Of  course  most  coun 
try  folk  do  pay  their  debts  first  or  last,  but  many  of  them 
do  it  grudgingly.  It  almost  requires  a  surgical  operation 
to  get  the  old  pocket-book — pathetically  lean — out  of  the 
long  trowsers-pocket,  and  it  seems  an  eternity  before  it 
opens  and  the  little  money  the  poor  farmer  has  scraped 
up  with  hard  toil  is  laid  before  the  remorseless  creditor. 

All  debts  are  divided  into  classes.  They  begrudge 
less  the  paying  out  of  money  for  what  are  called  neces 
saries — what  they  eat  and  drink.  Then  come  the  taxes, 
which  must  be  paid,  or  the  sacred  soil  will  be  seized  and 
sold.  It  is  harder  to  meet  the  demand  for  the  payment 
of  children's  schooling,  which  to  many  seems  hardly  so 
needful  as  children's  shoes.  Even  at  this  late  day  there 
are  country  folk  who  shrewdly  suspect  that,  beyond  the 
three  R's,  schooling  is  a  device  foisted  upon  them  by  the 
enemy,  to  make  the  boys  and  girls  less  willing  to  work  in 
the  old  groove  their  fathers  have  worn  ;  which  gives 
them  high  notions  and  separates  them  from  humble  but 
worthy  relatives  who  are  not  at  all  strong  in  grammar. 
School  money,  therefore,  stands  in  a  category  by  itself, 
and  must  from  the  very  nature  of  the  case  come  hard. 
But  it  is  paid  with  alacrity  compared  with  the  doctor's 
bill,  the  pew  rent,  and  the  newspaper  subscription.  There 
is  something  more  intangible  about  the  benefit  conferred 
by  these  than  even  about  schooling.  If  the  doctor,  the 
pastor,  and  the  editor  could  be  paid  by  a  cord  of  wood 
or  a  little  "  sass,"  it  would  come  willingly.  For  cord- 


A    POST-MERIDIAN    VIEW.  409 

wood  and  "  sass  "  are  far  less  mysterious  and  sacred  in 
the  eyes  of  country  folk  than  those  counters  of  civiliza 
tion,  bank-notes  and  cart-wheel  silver  dollars.  "  Sass  " 
and  cord-wood  are  often  given  away  with  a  kindness 
most  good  and  gracious.  But  unfortunately  the  fashion 
of  paying  with  the  fruits  of  the  earth  has  gone  out  of 
date.  The  parson,  a  notably  long-suffering  man,  has  re 
fused  to  take  any  more  barrels  of  apples  and  quarter- 
loads  of  pumpkins  in  return  for  the  spiritual  pabulum  he 
deals  out  of  a  Sunday. 

I  must  confess  that  I  have  a  good  deal  of  sympathy 
with  the  farmer's  reluctance  to  pay  for  medical  advice 
and  old  drugs  which  perhaps  did  no  good  to  his  inside, 
but  positive  harm  ;  for  old  sermons  now  quite  cold  in  the 
memory,  and  which  refuse  to  warm  over  ;  and  for  old 
newspapers,  which  it  is  conceded  by  every  body,  are  the 
stalest  of  all  stale  things.  It  is  what  one  may  call  this 
post-meridian  view  of  physic,  theology,  and  news  that 
makes  the  demand  for  payment  look  so  preposterous  in 
the  farmer's  eyes.  But  still  I  perceive  that  the  doctor, 
the  parson,  and  the  editor  have  a  certain  value  in  a  com 
munity,  and  ought  not  to  be  allowed  to  starve  outright, 
though  they  often  do,  as  we  know,  waste  away  in  a  slow 
absorption  of  their  substance,  as  bears  live  through  the 
winter,  sucking  their  paws. 

You  know  very  well  that  a  man  who  attends  to  every 
body's  business  generally  neglects  his  own.  This  to  a 
marked  degree  had  been  the  case  with  Dr.  John  Riving- 
ton.  Inwardly  he  groaned  over  the  confusion  of  his  af 
fairs,  but  outwardly  he  slipped  along  as  he  had  done  for 
years,  recording  the  amounts  due  him  in  his  ledgers,  but 
making  few  vigorous  efforts  to  collect  long  outstanding 
debts.  He  could  be  kind  to  every  body  but  himself.  So 
long  as  he  was  in  the  prime  of  life  it  did  not  matter  much  ; 
he  could  always  manage  to  scrape  together  enough  to 
live  on.  But  now,  though  still  vigorous,  he  was  begin- 


410  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

ning  to  feel  in  himself  those  subtle  approaches  of  age  he 
knew  so  well — slight  touches  of  gout,  nipping  pains  in 
the  joints,  a  coldness  of  the  stomach  in  the  morning  that 
needed  warming  up  with  a  dose  of  bitters,  a  disinclina 
tion  to  do  night-work,  slower  motions,  as  if  the  old  ma 
chine  were  beginning  to  run  down,  and  yet  no  visible 
improvement  of  temper,  but  rather  a  tendency  to  look 
upon  the  present  condition  of  the  world  as  very  black 
and  hopeless,  while  all  in  the  past  lay  steeped  in  the 
aura  of  childish  happiness,  when  he  and  his  brother 
George  were  lads  together — how  long  ago  in  the  dim  and 
faded  past  ! 

Much  had  come  and  gone  to  make  the  brothers  for 
getful  and  indifferent  toward  each  other,  but  now  pic 
tures  of  the  old  days  began  to  come  back  to  the  doctor 
like  sun-flashes,  bright  and"  warm,  and  at  times  he  almost 
yearned  with  a  woman's  tenderness  to  see  George  again, 
to  live  over  the  boyish  times  when  they  went  to  school 
together,  with  arms  thrown  carelessly  about  each  other's 
shoulders.  Those  things  came  back  with  such  vividness 
that  he  lived  over  the  sports  and  fun  of  far-away  times  ; 
he  heard  the  sound  of  George's  careless  whistle,  the 
very  tones  of  his  voice  in  the  room  even  before  he  arose 
in  the  morning.  He  was  living  in  fancy  in  his  mother's 
house,  and  the  present  seemed  to  lose  its  grip  and 
reality.  Then  the  doctor  suspected  he  was  getting 
senile.  For  over  thirty  years  he  and  George  had  not 
met — had  only  occasionally  corresponded  for  part  of  the 
time  to  make  formal  inquiries  about  each  other's  health 
and  fortunes.  They  wrote  always  in  a  stiff,  oldjfashioned 
way  now  quite  out  of  date.  They  sent  these  duty-letters 
to  each  other  once  or  twice  a  year,  closing  "  Your  well 
wisher  and  ob'd't  servant."  There  was  an  ancient  court 
esy  about  this  correspondence  that  made  one  think  of 
foolscap  sheets  and  old  seals.  But  the  brothers  had 
really  so  little  to  say  to  each  other  that  they  often  ran 


A    BROTHER'S   WRONG.  411 

aground  in  the  first  dozen  lines,  and  eked  out  a  sheet 
with  the  condition  of  the  crops  and  the  state  of  the 
weather  in  their  respective  neighborhoods. 

All  the  years  of  separation  until  now  Dr.  Jack  had  felt 
his  heart  burning  with  a  sense  of  a  brother's  wrong. 
George  was  less  warm-hearted,  hot-headed,  impetuous, 
and  uncalculating  than  his  brother.  They  had  quarreled 
about  a  girl,  of  course,  and  she  had  married  George,  as 
the  doctor  believed,  through  an  unfair  advantage  which 
his  brother  had  taken.  But  possibly  he  was  wrong  in  all 
this.  The  hard  feeling  and  the  inevitable  separation 
came  all  the  same.  George  had  gone  far  away  to  the 
south-west  and  had  become  great  in  mining  business,  in 
farming,  and  railroads.  He  was  a  rich  and  powerful 
man,  but  scorned  of  his  poor  brother,  the  village  doctor. 
Dead  silence  between  them  for  over  twenty  years.  Then 
she  died,  George's  wife,  and  he  wrote  to  Jack  for  the 
first  time.  It  was  a  kind  of  smothered  heart-cry  from  a 
desolate  man,  and  the  correspondence  began  with  a  touch 
of  sympathy,  but  soon  lapsed  into  that  formal,  polite  old 
style  that  mocks  the  heart  and  feeds  it  with  the  east  wind 
when  we  long  for  a  warm  seat  beside  a  brother's  hearth. 
She  was  gone,  and  the  doctor  could  hardly  remember 
how  she  had  looked.  All  the  life  and  fire  had  gone  out  of 
that  old  time  when  he  had  quivered  with  emotion  and 
suffered  such  burning  heats  and  chilis  for  her  sake.  But 
kinship  has  a  longer  and  tougher  root.  It  comes  up  in 
green  shoots,  and  puts  forth  little  blossoms  long  after  we 
think  it  is  quite  dead. 

Dr.  Jack  cared  nothing  about  the  rich  man  ;  indeed, 
was  rather  scornful  and  hostile  toward  him.  The  old 
quarrel  had  left  enough  acerbity  for  purposes  of 
family  criticism.  Yet,  unaccountably,  he  longed  for  the 
brother  he  had  lost  so  long  ago.  Oh,  that  he  might  get 
the  lad  back  again,  and  dog  on  behind  him  as  he  used  to 
do  up  the  hilly  lane,  all  aglow  from  swimming  in  the 


412  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

pond  !  He  lived  over  their  boyish  scrapes  in  the  barn 
and  on  fishing  tours  ;  how  they  played  truant  from 
school  to  dig  out  a  muskrat  ;  how  the  old  horse  Deacon 
ran  away  one  Fourth  of  July  when  they  were  going  to  a 
"  celebration  "  in  the  next  town,  and  threw  George  out 
and  stunned  him  and  cut  his  head  a  little,  so  that  the 
blood  flowed  down  his  temple,  and  how  scared  he  (Jack) 
was. 

He  knew  he  was  getting  senile,  because  he  contin 
ually  lived  over  the  old  boyish  life  of  fifty  years  ago 
when  he  was  driving  along  country  roads,  and  the 
autumnal  scents  and  sunshine  warm  on  the  dying  leaves 
touched  some  chord  in  his  heart  and  made  it  vibrate. 
He  would  laugh  aloud  to  himself  over  George's  tricks 
and  sharpness  when  a  boy.  He  (Jack)  always  came  out 
at  the  little  end  of  the  horn  with  his  brother  in  a  trade,  a 
bargain,  or  a  swap.  George  got  all  the  best  things  in 
the  end,  and  there  was  nothing  belonging  to  old  blunder- 
heels  Jack,  not  even  his  sweetheart,  which  he  coveted 
that  he  did  not  contrive  to  win  away.  But  the  doctor 
could  think  of  it  now  with  a  kind  of  admiring  indulgent 
tenderness  for  George,  making  him  only  the  fonder  of 
the  lad. 

Strange  to  say,  in  his  letters  to  his  brother  he  never 
hinted  at  these  feelings,  which  he  would  have  been 
ashamed  to  confess  to  any  body.  The  rich  railroad-man 
and  land-owner  in  the  south-west,  an  oldish  man  now, 
alone  in  the  world,  and  somewhat  broken  by  ill-health, 
was  not  George,  that  sharp,  wide-awake,  cunning  little 
chap.  But  where  was  George  ?  he  asked  whimsically. 
Somehow  he  had  miserably  perished  out  of  the  world. 
The  boy  was  non-existent.  He  could  never  even  hope 
to  meet  him  in  heaven,  if  there  is  such  a  place,  and  yet 
the  old  doctor  longed  so  for  him  his  heart  at  times  felt 
actually  sore  ;  he  had  a  dim  notion  that  old  blunder- 
heels  Jack,  who  had  allowed  himself  to  be  hoodwinked, 


AN  INVETERATE  DREAMER.  413 

and  cheated,  and  ridden  over  rough-shod,  was  somehow 
intact  in  his  own  breast.  Many  and  many  a  time  he  had 
backed  little  George  up  the  lane  to  show  his  superior 
strength.  Alas,  he  would  never  do  it  again.  Soon  they 
would  carry  him  out  by  the  feet ;  and  there  was  no  hope 
of  finding  in  the  other  world  the  lost  lad  that  he  had 
loved. 

So  you  see  the  doctor,  with  all  his  pathological  insight 
into  his  own  case,  was  an  inveterate  dreamer.  His  dream 
territory  was  much  larger  than  his  actual  possessions. 
It  took  only  a  line  of  poetry,  a  strain  of  some  old  song 
his  granddaughter  sang  at  the  piano,  and  which  he 
caught  of  an  evening  as  he  opened  the  door,  to  set  him 
tingling  all  over,  every  fiber  quick  with  young  feeling. 
But  now  his  granddaughter  was  growing  up  a  tall,  hand 
some  girl.  She  must  be  sent  away  to  school.  She  must 
be  portioned  some  time  in  marriage.  The  little  fortune  left 
her  by  her  grand-aunt  (greatly  exaggerated  by  public 
rumor)  had  now  it  was  discovered  dwindled  away  to  a 
mere  nothing  owing  to  its  original  investment  in  the 
stock  of  a  wild-cat  mining  company.  These  thoughts 
came  to  him  one  day  when  he  discovered  Effie  was  no 
longer  a  child,  but  had  put  on  long  dresses  and  wore  her 
hair  "  tucked  up."  Indeed,  the  top  of  her  curly  head 
now  came  higher  than  his  shoulder.  The  doctor  put  his 
arm  round  her  with  the  confused  feeling  that  he  was  doing 
something  improper  in  embracing  a  strange  young  lady. 

That  evening,  with  a  great  deal  of  inward  groaning 
and  many  grimaces,  he  drew  down  from  his  office  shelf 
his  old  dusty  ledgers,  some  of  which  dated  as  far  back 
as  1850.  His  wife  had  always  been  mildly  urging  him 
to  collect  his  bills.  Now  he  had  two  lamps  brought  in, 
and,  locking  the  office  door,  he  settled  down  to  a  long 
spell  of  work,  the  hardest  job  of  his  whole  life.  After 
long  years  of  carelessness  and  neglect  of  his  own  interest, 
he  was  resolved  now  to  have  a  settlement  with  his  debt- 


414  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

ors,  and  to  call  in  at  least  a  portion  of  what  was  due  him. 
It  is  safe  to  say  that  he  would  gladly  have  endured  much 
physical  torture  rather  than  put  his  hand  to  this  needful 
business.  He  had  lain  awake  the  previous  night  and 
planned  to  send  the  bills  out  through  the  post,  thus 
screening  himself  as  far  as  possible  from  the  well-merited 
wrath  of  his  neighbors.  On  looking  the  case  over  dis 
passionately,  he  found  himself  taking  their  side  in 
advance.  As  he  clapped  the  dust  off  the  covers  of  those 
old  ledgers  he  hated  them  with  a  deadly  hatred.  A 
thousand  times  he  had  been  tempted  to  burn  them,  and 
he  bitterly  regretted  that  he  had  not  acted  on  his  impulse, 
for  the  futility  of  what  he  was  about  to  do  weighed  him 
down.  But  he  owed  this  sacrifice  of  personal  feeling  to 
the  child.  He  would  have  given  his  heart's  blood  to  her, 
and  now  his  gray  head  went  down  over  the  hateful  page. 
He  squared  his  elbows,  savagely  dipped  his  pen  in  ink, 
and  began  to  run  his  eye  down  long  rows  of  entries — 
names,  dates,  figures.  He  muttered,  and  mumbled,  and 
groaned  to  himself  as  he  tried  to  make  head  or  tail  out 
of  this  dreadful  piece  of  work.  "  M-m-m,  M-m-Fisher, 
ten  years'  medicines  and  attendance.  M-m-m-Forbes, 
eighty  visits.  Old  man  dead.  M-m-m-m-m-Hicks, 
paralytic.  Jones,  debt  outlawed." 

For  a  week,  girding  at  the  horrid  task,  ejaculating  and 
spluttering  as  if  taking  some  of  his  own  bitter  stuff,  the 
doctor  kept  on  intermittently  with  what  he  had  in  hand. 
In  spite  of  all  the  outlawed  debts,  the  removals,  and  the 
large  sums  he  had  given  outright  to  the  poor,  and  crossed 
off  finally,  he  was  appalled  by  the  amount  justly  due  him 
in  the  country.  He  thought  the  matter  over  for  a  few  days, 
and  then  decided  to  deduct  twenty  per  cent,  from  all 
the  bills,  and  to  inclose  each  in  a  little  explanatory  note 
modestly  setting  forth  his  necessities.  This  he  hoped 
would  partly  take  the  curse  off  the  whole  proceeding. 
•He  called  in  his  granddaughter  to  copy  all  the  bills,  and 


THE  PINCH    COMES.  4*5 

write  the  letters  in  her  school-girl  hand  from  a  form  which 
he  had  prepared.  Perhaps  he  secretly  hoped  that  inno 
cent  chirography  might  make  its  appeal  to  the  hearts  of 
his  neighbors. 

The  bills  were  sent  out  on  a  Thursday  afternoon. 
Luckily  it  was  a  healthy  time  ;  and  for  three  days  there 
after  the  doctor  kept  as  much  as  possible  within  doors. 
He  felt  so  ashamed  and  humiliated  he  knew  not  how  to 
face  any  body,  and  yet,  as  he  fumbled  about  in  his  mind, 
he  could  discover  no  just  ground  for  the  feeling,  unless 
it  was  that  he  had  so  long  neglected  his  duty  to  himself, 
his  debtors  might  feel  that  they  had  a  claim  on  his  crim 
inal  carelessness  which  would  offset  all  they  owed  him. 
He  knew  the  pinch  would  come,  like  turning  a  door  on  a 
finger  in  the  crack,  and  he  felt  for  his  neighbors  quite 
impersonally  by  aid  of  the  sympathetic  imagination  with 
which  he  was  endowed. 

For  a  few  days  the  village  was  sullen  and  silent.  Its 
astonishment  knew  no  bounds.  But  at  length  the  clamor 
broke  forth.  One  old  woman  complained  bitterly  that 
all  the  members  of  her  family  he  had  doctored  were  dead. 
He  could  only  answer  that  one  was  a  cripple,  and  another 
a  very  old  person,  and  he  had  prolonged  their  lives  for 
years,  often  riding  five  miles  on  cold  winter  nights  to 
minister  to  them.  It  is  peculiar  to  human  nature,  let  the 
disease  be  what  it  may,  to  believe  that  if  a  friend  had 
been  differently  treated  he  or  she  would  have  recovered. 
Now  all  the  old  cases  were  raked  up  out  of  their  graves, 
and  to  hear  the  talk  in  the  village  you  would  suppose 
that  earthly  immortality  might  have  reigned  there,  and 
Burying-Ground  Hill  be  now  untenanted,  but  for  the  doc 
tor's  drugs.  Can  people  be  expected  to  pay  the  doctor 
for  killing  off  their  relatives,  especially  after  the  debts 
have  mostly  outlawed  ?  The  idea  is  preposterous.  A 
few  friends,  especially  the  little  milliner  and  Mrs.  Judge 
Magnus,  were  hotly  indignant  at  all  this  ungrateful,  hard- 


41 6  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

hearted  talk,  but  their  heat  did  little  good.  Some  peo 
ple  refused  to  pay  the  old  bills  because  they  had  lost  all 
track  of  them,  and  did  not  believe  they  were  owing  any 
thing.  Others  demanded  large  reductions,  which  the 
doctor  made  with  a  sardonic  smile  on  his  face.  He  had 
worked  for  these  people  year  in  and  year  out,  and  yet 
they  would  stone  him  if  they  could,  when  he  asked  them 
to  pay  only  a  small  part  of  what  was  his  due.  One  day 
he  came  into  his  wife's  sitting-room  looking  thoroughly 
disgusted  and  out  of  tune. 

"Well,  well,"  he  grunted,  "you  made  me  do  it.  You 
got  me  into  this  scrape.  You  would  keep  at  me  about 
the  bills"  (the  doctor  could  be  terribly  unjust  in  such 
moods),  "and  now  I  have  turned  all  the  folks  against 
me,  and  all  for  nothing.  I  have  only  been  able  to  collect 
less  than  a  thousand  dollars,  when  there  are  eight  or  ten 
thousand  due  me,  at  the  lowest  figure.  When  I  die  there 
will  be  nothing  left  for  you  and  Effie  except  this  house, 
unless  I  insure  my  life  and  put  a  ball  and  chain  on  my 
leg." 

"  No  need  of  that,"  said  Mrs.  Rivington,  in  her  low, 
sad  voice.  "  I  shall  go  first,  and  Effie  will  marry  a  better 
business  man  than  you  are,  John,  and  she  will  keep  you 
when  you  are  old." 

The  doctor  gave  a  scornful  laugh  and  flung  out  of  the 
room.  When  his  wife  wished  to  exasperate  him  she 
always  began  to  talk  about  "going  first."  He  went  to 
his  office  and  slammed  and  locked  the  door,  and  began 
to  smoke  like  a  steam-engine.  He  was  angry  with  his 
wife,  but  he  knew  she  was  as  innocent  as  a  saint  above. 
In  a  few  days,  when  he  had  nearly  smoked  himself  to 
death,  he  came  out  into  peace  of  mind  and  sweet  reason 
ableness,  sweeter  than  clarified  honey.  He  went  one 
afternoon  and  picked  some  late  artemisias  in  the  old 
garden,  and  came  and  pinned  them  gallantly  in  his  wife's 
kerchief.  "  Judith,"  said  he,  "  let  the  old  debts  be  d . 


THE  BROTHER  IS  FOUND.  4*7 

I  know  I  am  a  dragon  to  live  with,  and  I  wonder  you 
have  stood  it  so  long." 

She  looked  up  with  her  lovely  old  eyes  just  slightly 
suffused.  Ah  me,  if  we  could  only  be  a  little  kinder  to 
those  we  love  ! 

It  was  just  as  this  scene  was  taking  place  within  doors 
that  the  best  depot  hack  drove  up  to  the  door.  That 
hack  charged  fifty  cents  apiece  for  passengers,  while  the 
second-best  charged  only  twenty-five.  When  the  best 
hack  drove  up  to  the  door  people  always  felt  that  some 
body  had  been  rather  recklessly  extravagant.  "  Who  is 
it  ? "  said  the  doctor,  as  he  looked  out  of  the  window. 
"  Are  you  expecting  a  visitor  ?  "  And  then  he  motioned 
to  his  wife  with  his  eyes.  She  shook  her  head,  and  went 
and  looked  over  the  doctor's  shoulder.  The  man  who 
alighted  from  the  best  hack  was  older  in  appearance  than 
the  doctor,  and  quite  white  about  the  brow.  He  walked 
a  little  lame,  and  leaned  on  a  stick  as  he  came  slowly 
through  the  front  yard.  He  entered  the  house  without 
knocking,  as  if  it  had  been  his  own.  The  doctor  stood 
riveted  to  his  place,  with  something  of  wonder,  almost 
of  fright,  painted  on  his  features.  The  stranger  came  in 
and  took  off  his  hat  to  Mrs.  Rivington,  with  a  gesture 
that  would  have  been  most  urbane  but  for  the  tremor  in 
his  hands.  He  never  knew  what  he  said.  He  drew  near 
to  the  doctor,  and  their  hands  felt  for  each  other  and 
clasped.  They  looked  into  each  other's  eyes,  and  the 
boy  George  must  have  come  up  some  way  into  those 
faded,  pale-blue  orbs,  for  the  doctor  fell  on  his  neck, 
half-choked  and  fairly  sobbing,  "  My  brother  was  lost, 
but  is  found." 

George  Rivington  sat  down  gasping  a  little.  It  was 
evident  his  heart  was  not  very  strong.  "  I  will  get  you  a 
draught,"  said  the  doctor,  alarmed. 

"  No,  no,  I  want  you,"  returned  George,  faintly,  reach 
ing  out  his  hand.  Like  so  many  poor  creatures,  he 


41 8  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS., 

was  ill  for  that  vivifying  affection  that  brings  new 
life. 

It  was  enough  to  spoil  our  petted  and  pampered  pess 
imism  to  see  those  two  old  brothers  going  about  the  vil 
lage  together.  It  seemed  to  bring  back  the  feeling  of  a 
fount  of  sweet,  pure  goodness  welling  up  in  life — a  prin 
ciple  divine  and  incalculable,  in  spite  of  our  arid  doubts 
or  more  arid  beliefs.  They  lived  their  lives  all  over 
again.  They  even  came  to  the  most  perfect  understand 
ing  about  the  long  estrangement  and  its  cause.  They 
laughed  and  slapped  each  other  on  the  back  as  they 
talked  over  their  old  boyish  scrapes.  They  smoked  to 
gether,  and  sometimes  sat  hours  in  silence,  feeling  that 
the  luxury  of  unspoken  intercourse  brought  them  nearer 
than  words. 

One  morning  the  doctor  came  to  seek  his  wife  in  her 
own  room  :  "  My  dear,"  said  he — he  seldom  called  her 
"  my  dear  " — "  George  is  going  to  take  charge  of  Erne's 
education,  and  if  I  go  first " — this  with  a  little  malice — 
"he  will  see  that  you  want  for  nothing.  You  know,"  he 
added,  straightening  himself  a  little  proudly,  "  I  can  take 
it  from  a  brother." 

The  good  doctor  knew  how  blessed  it  is  to  give  ;  he 
now  knows  how  blessed  it  is  to  receive  for  love's  sake. 


CHAPTER    XLIII. 

THE     UNEARNED    INCREMENT. 

A  FTER  the  people  had  treated  the  doctor  about  as 
1\  badly  as  they  could,  and  had  flung  their  hard  words 
at  his  head,  .they  began  to  feel  ashamed  of  themselves. 
It  was  rumored  about  town  that  the  doctor  had  thought 
of  selling  out  to  a  young  practitioner  and  going  West 
with  his  brother  George.  Then  the  village  discovered 
that  he  was  the  chief  jewel  in  its  crown,  and  that  it  could 
not  live  without  him.  All  the  bitter,  sarcastic  remarks 
bearing  on  his  physic  and  treatment  of  cases  were  for 
gotten,  and  the  village  felt  desolated  in  advance  by  the 
mere  suggestion  of  his  departure.  Have  you  ever 
remarked  that  singular  trait  in  human  nature — that 
people  will  try  to  make  up  by  a  needless  spurt  of  gen 
erosity  for  some  essential  failure  in  justice  ?  It  is  like 
the  man  who  beat  his  wife  and  then  tried  to  soothe  her 
feelings  by  taking  her  to  a  circus.  Now,  the  villagers 
thought  to  salve  over  the  sore  place  in  the  doctor's  mind 
by  some  such  attempt.  The  whisper  went  round  among 
the  frightened  people  that  it  would  be  well  to  do  some 
thing  to  show  their  gratitude  to  the  doctor,  to  prove  to 
him  how  dear  and  valuable  he  was  to  them,  and  to  bind 
him  to  them  by  new  and  lasting  ties. 

Judge  Magnus  made  it  a  point  to  see  his  friends,  the 
richest  and  most  influential  men  in  the  neighborhood, 
and  to  say,  with  beautiful  expansiveness  and  manifold 
gesticulation,  that  something  must  be  done.  "  I  tell 
you,  sir,  we  must  celebrate  his  sixty-fifth  birthday  in 
Library  Hall,  and  we  must  do  it  in  fine  style — hand 
somely,  sir,  handsomely.  I  think  we  ought  to  present 


420  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

him  with  a  piece  of  plate— a  pitcher  or  a  salver.  Yes, 
sir  ;  we  must  do  the  thing  in  fine  shape,  and  show  the 
doctor  he  is  appreciated.  A  glorious  old  fellow,  sir,  if 
there  ever  was  one.  Mrs.  Magnus  is  devoted  to  him, 
and  so  am  I  ;  and  if  nobody  helps  buy  the  testimonial,  I 
will  do  it  all,  sir,  out  of  my  own  pocket.  It  is  a  shame 
the  doctor  has  never  received  any  token  of  regard  from 
his  townsmen.  I  shall  be  proud  to  head  a  subscription 
for  this  admirable  purpose." 

Milly,  when  she  heard  of  it,  remarked  dryly  that  if  the 
judge  bought  the  testimonial  and  presided  at  the  meet 
ing  and  made  the  speech  of  the  evening,  he  would  for 
get  all  about  the  doctor  and  present  the  piece  of  plate'to 
himself  in  a  perfect  sun-burst  of  self-admiration. 

But  the  judge  began  to  fuss  about,  looking  more  portly 
and  imposing  than  ever,  with  a  subscription  paper  in  hand, 
which  he  had  headed  with  the  sum  of  one  hundred  dollars. 
The  ladies  consulted  together  and  decided  to  trim  the  hall 
with  flowers,  greens,  and  autumn  leaves,  and  to  give  the 
refreshments,  which  were  to  be  of  the  choicest.  By  some 
means  or  other,  the  doctor  got  wind  of  the  affair.  Donner 
und  blitzen  !  You  ought  to  have  seen  the  storm  of  scorn 
and  rage  raised  in  that  good  man's  breast.  Heavens  ! 
had  he  come  to  the  ignominy  of  a  subscription  paper  ? 
"  Go  along  with  your  testimonial,"  he  growled,  with  other 
expressions  I  should  be  sorry  to  write  down  in  cold  blood. 
"  I  will  have  none  of  that  nonsense.  A  piece  of  plate, 
indeed  !  What  do  I  want  of  plate,  beyond  a  door-plate 
or  a  coffin-plate  ?  I  tell  you  I  will  not  give  the  thing 
house-room.  Nor  will  I  have  any  hypocritical  fuss  made 
over  me.  But  I  have  learned  a  wrinkle  or  two  from 
brother  George,  and  I  give  you  fair  warning,  every  six 
months  hereafter  my  bills  will  be  sent  out  promptly,  and 
if  they  are  not  paid,  they  will  be  placed  in  a  lawyer's 
hands  for  collection." 

Now  the  feeling  in  the  village  is  that  the  doctor  is  of  a 


SERMONS  ON  LIFE.  421 

very  bearish,  uncertain  temper  ;  that  his  peculiarities  are 
growing  upon  him,  and  poor  Mrs.  Rivington  is  very  much 
to  be  pitied  ;  and  that  this  new  rule  about  bills  is  a  rea 
son  for  keeping  as  well  as  possible  and  not  calling  in  the 
doctor  nearly  as  often  as  in  the  old  easy-going  days. 

The  young  clergyman  is  apt  to  preach  two  or  three 
startling  sermons  after  he  comes  home,  and  the  vacation 
supply  of  ex-college  professors  and  clericals  ceases.  He 
knows  his  people  deserve  some  compensation  for  sitting 
under  a  preacher  like  Stackpole  and  listening  to  his  long- 
winded  discourses  about  how  Joshua  blew  down  the  city 
wall  with  a  ram's  horn,  and  how  the  sun  stood  still  upon 
Gideon.  Besides  his  orthodox  and  his  heterodox  foot 
the  young  man  has  a  third  means  of  support  as  yet 
unclassified.  When  standing  on  this  he  preaches  practi 
cal  sermons  on  the  conduct  of  life,  sermons  which,  we 
may  say,  relate  to  contemporaneous  human  interest,  and 
often  open  long  reaches  of  thought  and  are  as  innovating 
in  certain  ways  as  his  free-thinking  discourses.  When 
he  brings  in  discussions  about  egoism  and  altruism,  the 
people  feel  not  a  little  complimented.  It  is  doing  rever 
ence  to  the  village  intellect  to  suppose  it  can  understand 
such  things. 

About  a  year  ago  the  young  parson  preached  a  remarka 
ble  discourse  on  sacrifice,  in  which  he  attempted  to  show 
that  the  commonly  received  opinion  of  sacrifice  is  wrong 
and  immoral.  We  have  no  right,  he  said,  to  demand  the 
abasement  of  a  high,  pure,  beautiful  nature  to  a  low,  selfish, 
bestial  character.  We  have  no  right  to  crucify  the  best 
and  noblest  in  us  to  pamper  the  evil  passions  and  indulge 
the  coarse  vices  of  degraded  beings.  Such  an  immolation 
of  the  good,  though  it  is  often  lauded  by  people  calling 
themselves  Christians,  can  not  be  acceptable  to  God. 
He  illustrated  his  discourse  by  allusions  to  characters  in 
two  well  known  novels — a  rather  startling  thing  in  itself — 
to  show  how  virtue  is  often  trampled  under  the  hoofs  of 


422  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

vice  in  obedience  to  a  false  standard  of  morality.  Then 
he  dwelt  on  the  duty  to  the  individual  soul,  the  effort  to 
wards  self-perfection  as  an  aim  of  life,  the  good  done  by 
raising  the  level  of  character,  and  wound  up  with  a  long 
and  thrilling  poetical  quotation. 

The  seeds  of  that  sermon  fell  here  and  there — some 
doubtless  on  poor  soil,  some  an  stony  ground,  but  a  few 
were  dropped  and  germinated  in  the  most  unlikely  place. 
Sitting  in  one  of  the  front  pews  with  Salmon  A.  Poindex- 
ter's  children  and  the  governess  who  taught  them  French, 
German,  and  music,  was  Miss  Christina  Poindexter,  sister 
to  the  said  Salmon  A.  She  was  one  of  those  round-faced, 
placid,  mild-looking  New  England  women  who  never 
crimp  the  front  hair,  or  "  bang  "  it,  but  brush  it  smooth 
against  an  unlined  brow,  and  look  out  upon  the  world 
with  thoughtful  and  intelligent  eyes  and  no  little  sweetness 
and  charm  of  expression,  long  after  they  have  passed 
their  first  youth.  The  Poindexters  are  not  exactly  of  the 
village.  They  live  upon  the  fringes  of  it,  two  or  three 
miles  down  the  valley,  on  the  slope  of  a  green  knoll, 
which  has  been  adorned  with  beautiful  lawns  and  shrub 
beries  and  a  goodly  number  of  rather  poor  statues,  which 
are  to  Mr.  Poindexter's  taste,  though  his  wife  more  than 
half  objects  to  so  many  unclad  composition  nymphs  shiv 
ering  about  in  the  wet  and  cold.  The  house  is  new  and 
large,  of  staring  red  brick  and  terracotta,  and  it  com 
mands  a  lovely  view  of  the  valley  and  distant  ranges  of 
hills.  When  it  was  first  erected,  it  was  so  very  red,  the 
joke  went  about  the  country  that  the  scarlet  fever  had 
broken  out  on  Poindexter's  place. 

Salmon  A.  Poindexter  has  been  a  very  prosperous  busi 
ness  man  ;  moreover,  he  has  had  the  good  fortune  to 
marry  a  rich  wife,  whose  thousands  he  has  increased  to 
tens  of  thousands  by  shrewd  investments,  until  now  it  is 
said  that  he  is  verysolid,  worth  at  least  a  million  of  dollars, 
and  perhaps  more.  Poindexter  comes  flashing  through 


SALMON  A.  423 

the  village  with  his  high-stepping  horses,  his  glittering 
equipage,  and  jingling  sun-bright  harness.  He  looks 
about  him  as  if  he  owned  every  thing,  and  we,  poor  creat 
ures,  were  only  there  on  sufferance.  His  sense  of  own 
ership  and  moneyed  superiority  is  not  at  all  like  that  of 
Judge  Magnus — a  simple,  old-fashioned,  local  pride,  as 
transparent  as  window-glass.  Salmon  A.'s  has  an  element 
of  arrogance  the  people  resent,  while  they  love  the  judge 
and  laugh  at  him  with  right  good  will.  Poindexter's 
prosperity  is  new  and  shiny,  and  so  full-blown  it  pervades 
every  thing  like  a  too  rank  vegetable  odor.  Poor  devils 
who  have  not  chanced  to  make  a  success  in  life,  though 
they  have  tried  with  the  best  intentions,  find  themselves 
squeezed  against  the  wall  in  his  presence.  Salmon  A. 
naturally  likes  to  associate  with  millionaires.  If  he  con 
descends  to  men  of  low  degree,  there  is  something  of 
offense  in  his  manner,  as  much  as  to  say,  "  I  could  buy 
and  sell  you  twenty  times  over  if  I  chose  to  put  my  hand 
in  my  pocket."  There  is  hardly  any  one  in  the  village 
with  whom  he  feels  he  can  associate  except  the  judge, 
and  the  latter  always  likes  to  play  first  fiddle  in  his  own 
district ;  he  does  not,  therefore,  care  much  about  mixing 
up  with  Poindexter. 

Salmon  A.  respects  his  wife  because  she  is  his  wife, 
and  because  her  father  had  the  good  sense  to  accumulate 
a  large  fortune  for  him  to  handle,  enlarge  and  enjoy.  But 
it  may  be  said  that  his  sister  Crissie,  that  plain,  modest, 
unassuming  old  maid,  was  nearer  to  him  for  years  than 
any  body  else.  He  thought  he  knew,  about  the  time 
I  am  writing  of,  every  fold  and  crease  in  Crissie's  na 
ture,  for  she  was  a  part  of  himself,  and  had  never  had 
any  other  life  than  his  life,  or  any  other  interests  than  his 
interests.  Before  he  married,  Crissie  had  kept  house  for 
her  brother,  and  later,  it  may  be  said  she  still  kept  his 
house.  Though  Mrs.  Poindexter  was  the  head  of  the 
family,  like  many  of  the  wealthy  and  pampered  people  of 


424  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

our  time  she  was  uneasy  and  restless  in  a  beautiful  home, 
and  liked  to  flit  about  to  the  South,  and  to  Europe,  to  the 
watering  places  in  summer.  She  was  perfectly  well,  but 
she  still  felt  that  the  state  of  her  health  demanded  fre 
quent  change. 

But  Crissie  was  always  at  home  as  care-taker  and  gen 
eral  manager.  The  children  could  be  left  with  her  at 
any  time.  Mrs.  Poindexter  was  aware  that  Crissie  knew 
more  about  their  diseases  and  dispositions  than  she  her 
self  did.  The  middle  girl,  Beatrice,  had  slept  with  her 
aunt  until  she  was  five  or  six,  and  the  children  certainly 
minded  Aunt  Cris  with  as  much  alacrity  as  their  mother, 
and  perhaps  loved  her  more.  But  Mrs.  Poindexter  was 
not  jealous.  Crissie  was  too  great  a  godsend  to  her  for 
that.  She  wondered  and  speculated  about  her  sister-in- 
law  a  great  deal.  She  tried  to  penetrate  into  her  mind, 
and  learn  the  secret  of  her  placidity.  Why  did  she  go  on 
with  this  life  ?  Why  did  she  not  break  violently  away  ? 
Not  for  worlds  would  she  have  been  Cris.  She  contrasted 
her  own  rich  and  rather  flamboyant  dress  with  Crissie's 
plain,  demure  style.  How  could  Cris  stand  it  ?  Always 
at  the  bottom  of  her  mind  lay  the  dread  that  Cris  would 
some  day  discover  she  was  not  bound  over  hand  and  foot 
for  life,  and  would  assert  her  independence. 

When  Mrs.  Poindexter  was  at  home,  she  liked  to  have 
the  house  well  filled  with  fashionable  friends,  and  it  some 
times  happened,  at  an  over-crowded  moment,  that  Cris 
sie's  room  was  required  by  a  visitor.  Then  she  went 
quietly  into  the  nursery  and  slept  with  one  of  the  little 
girls.  Moreover,  if  the  pastry  cook  departed  at  a  moment's 
notice,  as  pastry  cooks  are  apt  to  do,  Crissie  could  be  de 
pended  upon  to  make  delicious  desserts,  pastry,  and  ices, 
and  cake,  and  cream,  all  in  a  dainty  fashion  of  her  own. 
And  yet  she  was  a  highly  cultivated  woman,  although  Mrs. 
Poindexter's  guests  were  not  often  of  a  sort  to  discover 
the  fact.  She  had  read  much  and  enjoyed  music,  and 


A  SISTER-IN-LA  W  S  FICTION.  425 

pictures,  and  all  refined,  good  things.  She  was  interested 
in  ideas,  and  had  a  great  many  of  her  own  stowed  away 
under  her  smooth  brown  hair  and  back  of  those  clear  gray 
eyes.  She  had  not  cultivated  expression,  for  she  feared 
to  be  put  down  by  the  heavy  hand  of  Salmon  A.,  who 
felt  that  he  was  quite  able  to  do  the  thinking  of  the  family. 
He  would  not  openly  tolerate  ideas  in  his  women  kind, 
especially  in  Crissie.  Mrs.  Poindexter,  having  a  large 
fortune  in  her  own  right,  was  entitled  to  some  freedom  of 
opinion,  but  Crissie,  being  his  creature,  was  expected  to 
catch  the  reflection  of  his  mind  and  live  according  to  what 
he  deemed  proper  for  a  legal  spinster. 

Mrs.  Poindexter,  spite  of  the  fear  in  the  depths  of  her 
mind,  and  though  she  desired  not  to  be  untrue  to  herself, 
was  in  the  habit  of  saying  to  her  friends  that  Crissie  was 
the  most  domestic  creature  in  the  world.  No  existence 
would  suit  her  but  the  life  she  led  in  her  brother's  house. 
She  loved  the  children  so  dearly  it  was  impossible  to 
separate  her  from  them  a  single  night.  Nothing  was  so 
delightful  to  Crissie  as  to  give  up  her  own  bed  and  go  in 
and  sleep  with  the  little  girls.  Moreover,  she  enjoyed 
the  care  of  the  place,  and  was  very  fond  of  breaking  in 
green,  stupid  servants.  It  was  a  pleasure  for  her  to  be 
alone  with  them  part  of  the  year  in  that  great  house,  for 
no  one  cared  so  little  for  society  as  Cris. 

This  was  Mrs.  Poindexter's  story,  and  she  had  repeated 
it  over  so  often  that  at  moments  she  almost  believed  it. 
She  was  a  worldly  woman,  but  not  absolutely  unfeeling. 
In  one  corner  of  her  heart  she  loved  Crissie  and  pitied  her. 
She  wondered  at  times  to  herself,  as  she  dreamily  slipped 
the  diamond  rings  round  on  her  finger,  sitting  in  luxurious 
ease  before  the  great  open  fire  in  the  wide  hall,  how  Cris 
could  have  lived  all  these  years  unwedded — a  kind  of 
foot-ball  in  her  brother's  house — and  yet  have  kept  her 
sweetness  and  her  good  looks  ;  for  she  could  not  but 
confess  that  at  times  Crissie,  with  all  her  plainness,  was 


426  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

very  attractive.  Through  a  refined  selfishness,  which  it 
was  impossible  for  her  psychological  analysis  to  separate 
from  pure  good  feeling,  she  tried  to  take  her  sister-in- 
law's  part  with  Salmon. 

"  You  ought  not  to  speak  so  to  Cris,"  she  would  say  in 
these  moments  of  wifely  discipline.  4<  You  know  she  is 
very  sensitive.  If  you  must  bully  somebody,  bully  me. 
Wives,  I  suppose,  were  made  to  be  bullied." 

"  Bullied — sensitive  ;  what  do  you  mean,  Angeline  ? 
Don't  I  know  Crissie  just  like  a  book  ?  She  is  my  own 
kin,  and  it's  a  pity  if  I  don't  understand  her  better  than 
any  body  else.  Do  you  suppose  she  minds  what  I  say  to 
her  when  I  am  vexed  ?  Poh  !  Why,  she  expects  I  will 
be  a  little  rough  sometimes.  Father  was  before  me,  and 
she  knows  where  it  comes  from.  Don't  try  to  teach  me, 
Angeline,  how  I  am  to  treat  my  own  sister.  Leave  Cris 
sie  alone  ;  she  is  a  level-headed  woman  if  ever  there  was 
one." 

"  Well,  I  know  I  should  resent  your  roughness  if  I  were 
your  sister,"  laughed  his  wife.  "  I  often  wonder  how 
Crissie  can  stand  it." 

"  I  am  very  glad  you  are  not  my  sister.  We  should 
always  be  fighting  like  cat  and  dog,  but  as  my  wife,  with 
all  your  whims  indulged,  we  get  along  comfortably 
enough." 

"  It  don't  cost  you  any  thing  to  indulge  my  whims," 
returned  Angeline,  with  the  asperity  a  rich  wife  knows 
how  to  throw  into  a  cutting  little  speech. 

Crissie  had  thousands  of  thoughts  she  never  told  to  any 
body,  and  consequently  she  led  a  suppressed  life.  She 
was  one  of  the  "  shut-ins."  In  her  own  room  at  night, 
while  the  others  were  entertaining  company  down  stairs, 
and  the  children  were  in  bed,  asleep,  she  read  and  re 
flected.  Somewhere  in  a  work  on  political  economy  she 
came  upon  the  theory  of  the  unearned  increment  of  rent 
which  should  be  taxed  for  the  general  good,  and  the  idea 


HER   ONLY  LOVE  AFFAIR.  427 

struck  her  in  quite  a  new  and  original  light.  There,  she 
said  to  herself,  that  is  just  what  I  am,  an  unearned  incre 
ment,  something  that  belongs  to  the  proletariat,  a  kind 
of  common,  to  be  beaten  down  and  cropped  by  all  the 
herds — a  thing  without  individual  life,  a  convenience,  a 
poor  undivided  remainder,  left  over  for  all  the  members 
of  a  large  family  to  use,  but  belonging  to  none  of  them. 
The  thought  of  just  what  she  stood  for  in  the  realm  of 
exact  definitions  came  upon  Crissie  at  first  with  a  sense 
of  the  ludicrous,  but  later  she  began  to  cry  for  just  noth 
ing  at  all,  as  women  do  ;  and  old  memories  stirred  in  her, 
and  sobs  broke  up  the  depths  of  her  placid  exterior.  She 
recalled  her  only  love  affair  with  a  new  shock  of  pain — 
how  Salmon  had  broken  it  off  with  his  strong,  heavy 
hand,  because  Judson  was  poor,  and  he  wanted  Crissie  to 
minister  to  his  comfort ;  and  now  Judson  was  dead,  and 
she  was  an  attachment  in  a  rich  man's  house,  serving  on 
to  twice  seven  years. 

It  was  a  few  days  after  Crissie's  tempestuous  night, 
such  a  night  as  brings  new  weather  in  the  soul,  that 
Crissie  went  to  church  in  the  village  with  the  children 
and  the  governess,  and  the  young  clergyman  preached 
that  powerful  but  erratic  sermon  about  our  duty  to  our 
selves  and  the  perfection  of  being.  The  seed  fell  on 
prepared  ground  and  Crissie  came  home  with  her  eyes 
so  feverishly  bright  that  Mrs.  Poindexter  asked  her  at 
the  luncheon  table  if  she  were  not  well.  Oh,  yes,  she  was 
quite  well,  never  better.  In  fact  there  was  so  much 
moral  dynamite  stored  up  in  Crissie's  brain  at  that 
moment,  it  is  a  wonder  it  did  not  explode  and  blow  the 
roof  off.  Crissie  was  not  absolutely  dependent.  Her 
father  had  left  her  a  small  portion  at  his  death,  which 
her  brother  Salmon,  it  must  be  said  to  his  credit,  had 
managed  with  excellent  judgment.  He  was  always 
joking  her  about  her  estate,  telling  her  that  some  day  it 
might  actually  amount  to  ten  thousand  dollars,  and  per- 


VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

haps  by  his  shrewd  and  skillful  manipulations  might  yield 
her  an  interest  of  ten  per  cent. 

"  Of  course,"  he  would  say  to  his  wife,  "  Cris  will 
never  use  a  penny  of  it  ;  I  give  her  all  the  money  she 
wants,  and  she  is  naturally  economical.  When  she  dies, 
it  will  come  to  the  children  ;  and  it  is  a  mere  matter  of 
form,  my  keeping  it  separate,  with  an  account-book  of  its 
own.  You  see  what  a  conscientious  fellow  I  am." 

But  Mrs.  Poindexter,  who  was  always  on  the  alert 
about  Crissie,  with  her  sharp  feminine  eyes  noticed  that 
a  change  had  come  over  her  sister-in-law.  Her  eye  was 
brighter,  her  very  step  more  energetic  and  purposeful. 
What  could  it  mean  ?  Had  leaven  got  into  Crissie's 
dough  ?  When  not  engaged  with  her  household  duties, 
she  was  always  busy  in  her  own  room  writing  out  notes 
from  some  book,  and  footing  up  little  columns  of  figures 
on  scraps  of  paper.  One  of  these  fell  into  her  sister-in- 
law's  hands,  and  she  could  make  nothing  of  it,  but  she 
kept  it  to  show  to  Salmon,  and  then  forgot  all  about  it. 
It  happened  one  afternoon  that  Crissie  had  written  an 
important  letter  which  she  wished  to  post  privately  in 
the  village.  She  asked  for  the  carriage  ;  of  course  she 
could  always  have  it  when  it  was  not  in  demand  for  some 
other  member  of  the  household.  But  it  so  chanced  this 
afternoon  that  Mrs.  Poindexter  was  going  to  the  next  town 
for  a  drive,  where  she  would  meet  her  husband,  just  re 
turned  from  the  city. 

Crissie  withdrew  to  her  own  room,  and  with  trembling, 
eager  hands,  buttoned  her  street-jacket  and  tied  on  her 
bonnet.  It  was  the  first  step  toward  a  new  departure. 
She  slipped  out  of  the  side  door,  and  through  the  grounds, 
to  evade  the  children.  She  set  off  along  the  village  road 
in  a  half-run,  which  settled  into  a  dog-trot,  and  finally 
lapsed  into  a  quick,  nervous  walk.  Crissie  was  natur 
ally  not  much  of  a  walker.  Now  the  exercise  became 
delightful  to  her,  and  she  suspected  that  she  would 


THE   MOMENT  OF  REVOLT.  429 

have  aged  very  young  if  something  had  not  come  to 
stir  her  up.  The  sky  was  of  a  cool  November  blue,  with 
streaks  and  patches  of  purple  cloud  sailing  high.  The 
dark  hills  had  warm  gleams  upon  them,  and  the  air  tin 
gled  in  the  nostrils  and  braced  the  system  like  a  cordial. 
The  naked  trees,  rooted  in  mosses,  looked  friendly  and 
sympathetic  ;  and  as  she  went  along,  scattering  the  fallen 
leaves  with  the  swish  and  flow  of  her  skirts,  her  brain 
seemed  to  be  humming  some  old  doggerel,  keeping  time 
to  the  motion  of  her  feet.  First  it  went  "  Te-tum,  te-tum, 
te-tum.  I  am  not,  I  am  not."  Then  it  changed  a  little, 
"  I  will  not  be,  I  will  not  be  an  unearned  increment." 

As  Crissie  came  back  a  few  hours  later  she  met  the 
carriage  with  Mrs.  Poindexter  and  her  husband  beside 
her  on  the  back  seat,  looking  fairly  blossomed  red  in  the 
face  with  prosperity,  and  with  his  clothes  all  new  as  if 
they  had  just  come  off  the  shop  counter.  They  stopped 
the  carriage  and  took  her  in.  "  Why,  Cris,"  said  her 
sister-in-law,  "  I  thought  you  never  walked.  I  thought 
you  disliked  walking." 

"  I  thought  so  to,"  said  Cris,  "but  I  find  that  I  do 
like  it.  I  am  discovering  some  new  things  about  myself." 

Mrs.  Poindexter  telegraphed  with  her  eyes  to  her  hus 
band,  and  he  returned  the  glance,  quite  puzzled. 

"  Well,  I  have  made  a  pleasant  discovery,  too,  Cris, 
and  in  your  interest,"  said  Salmon.  "  Your  little  fortune 
yields  a  whole  thousand  this  year." 

"  I  am  glad  of  it,"  Cris  returned  demurely,  though  she 
was  quaking  inside.  "  I  shall  need  the  money." 

"  Don't  you  have  sufficient  pocket-money,  Cris  ?  " 

"  I  don't  mean  that.  I  am  going  to  live  for  a  time  on 
my  income." 

Salmon  gave  a  scornful,  incredulous  laugh,  and  Ange- 
line  turned  quite  pale.  She  saw  the  moment  of  revolt 
had  come. 

"  Bless  my  soul,"  cried  Salmon,  as  if  a  musquito  ha<4 


43°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS.  , 

revolted  against  his  big  hand.  u  If  our  Cris  isn't  going 
to  be  independent,  and  live  all  alone  by  herself,  and  have 
nothing  to  do  with  nobody." 

"  That's  about  it,"  and  Cris  shut  her  mouth  firmly,  and 
then  opened  it  again,  clinching  her  hands  under  the  edge 
of  the  carriage-robe  to  give  her  strength.  "  A  woman, 
though  she  is  unmarried — a  dreadful  old  maid — has  a 
right  to  some  portion  of  her  own  life.  She  is  an  individ 
ual,  and  not  an  un "  She  checked  herself.  It  would 

be  too  ridiculous  to  betray  that  secret.  Cris  said  this 
over  with  deliberate  slowness,  as  if  she  had  been  coach 
ing  herself  a  long  time,  which,  in  fact,  was  the  case.  But 
she  was  really  so  excited  she  hardly  knew  what  she  was 
saying. 

Salmon  again  laughed  scornfully  as  the  carriage  moved 
slowly  forward,  and  he  sat  there  just  opposite  his  sister — 
that  ungrateful  sister-worm  who  at  last  had  turned.  He 
refused  to  take  her  seriously,  and  yet  he  felt  a  strong  im 
pulse  of  rising  passion.  "  I  never  knew,  Cris,  there  was 
any  insanity  in  our  family,  but  I  begin  to  think  you  are 
out  of  your  mind.  What  do  you  propose  to  do,  now  you 
are  about  to  assert  your  brand-new  independence  and 
have  it  all  your  own  way  ?  " 

Cris  pulled  one  of  those  little  slips  of  paper  out  of  her 
pocket  she  had  been  scribbling  on  so  much  of  late  and 
began  to  read.  "  I  am  going  to  spend  the  winter  in  New 
York  and  shall  visit  art  galleries,  listen  to  music,  and  go 
to  the  theater.  The  Bruces  have  promised  to  take  charge 
of  me.  They  have  already  found  me  a  boarding-place. 
I  should  not  wonder  if  I  began  to  crimp  my  hair.  In  the 
spring  I  am  going  to  Germany,  living  is  so  cheap  and  de 
lightful  there.  I  know  just  with  whom  I  am  going  to 
stay — Frau  Lippert,  Alter  Strasse,  Wiesbaden.  Oh,  such 
a  homelike  place  and  such  good  cooking  !  You  couldn't 
hire  an  attic  in  New  York  for  what  I  shall  pay  Frau  Lip- 
pert.  I  am  enjoying  it  all  in  anticipation,  You  know  I 


"  YOU  ARE  CRAZY:'  431 

have  never  seen  much  of  the  world."  The  carriage  now 
stopped  at  the  door  and  the  master  of  it  descended  in  a 
rage  :  "  You  are  crazy,  crazy  as  a  loon,  to  think  of 
streaking  off  over  the  world  alone.  It  is  not  decent  or 
respectable,  and  I  will  never  permit  it.  Besides,  you  are 
horribly  hard-hearted  to  wish  to  leave  the  children  when 
they  are  at  such  an  interesting  age  and  so  attached  to 
you." 

"  There  is  a  child  in  my  own  soul  that  has  been  crying 
in  the  dark  this  many  a  year,"  said  Cris  :  "  and  I  know, 
Salmon  A.  Poindexter,  and  so  do  you,  that  I  belong  ab 
solutely  to  myself."  She  swept  out  of  the  room  looking 
a  foot  taller  than  usual.  Salmon  gazed  after  her  with 
stupid,  lowering  wonder,  and  then  he  fell  into  a  state  of 
angry  collapse,  ^nd  for  several  days  almost  refused  to 
speak  to  his  sister.  But  his  wife,  in  a  sudden,  unexpected 
fit  of  generosity,  took  Crissie's  side. 

"  I  am  glad  you  are  going,"  said  she.  "  I  respect  you 
for  it,  Cris.  Salmon  has  no  business  to  behave  as  he 
does  ;  and  I  know  now  that  I  have  wronged  you.  Hund 
reds  of  times  I  have  told  people  that  you  liked  to  be  a 
second  mother  to  the  children — to  give  up  every  thing 
and  stay  at  home,  and  bear  my  burdens.  I  made  myself 
half  believe  it,  and  now  I  am  so  sorry,  Crissie.  Say  you 
forgive  me."  Cris  kissed  her  sister-in-law.  It  was  just 
before  she  entered  the  carriage  to  take  the  train  for  New 
York.  If  Salmon  A.  had  known  just  what  part  the  young 
minister  had  unwittingly  played  in  his  domestic  affairs,  I 
believe  he  would  have  felt  like  thrashing  him. 


CHAPTER  XLIV. 

JOE    ELMORE    AND    BOB    SMARTWEED    AT    HOME. 

YOU  may  have  heard  of  the  literary  housewife  who 
stewed  her  angels.  Miss  Candace  has  asked  me  for 
a  recipe  to  do  up  villagers.  She  thinks  she  would  like  to 
can  some  for  winter  use.  I  can  only  say  that  villagers 
must  never  be  taken  in  a  crude  state.  It  is  bad  art,  and 
bad  for  the  mental  digestion.  You  must  cook  them  a 
long  time,  letting  them  simmer  gently  over  a  slow  fire — 
so  to  speak,  in  their  own  sauce.  You  must  not  try  to 
make  them  look  exactly  like  any  body  you  have  known, 
but  you  must  put  the  real  essence  of  human  nature  into 
them.  You  must  have  great  regard  to  that  invisible  side 
of  villagers  which,  like  the  shadowed  hemisphere  of  the 
moon,  we  do  not  see  with  the  naked  eye.  And  when 
they  come  out  of  your  preserving-kettle  done  to  a  turn, 
though  they  live  just  across  the  street  or  in  your  own 
house,  they  will  not  know  themselves  ;  they  will  believe 
that,  like  malaria,  they  belong  to  the  next  town.  I 
should  say  that  it  is  well  to  mix  more  of  sugar  than  of 
vinegar  in  the  confection,  and  the  product  will  be  a  kind 
of  sweet  pickle  which  seems  to  hit  the  average  of  human 
nature,  neither  good  nor  bad,  but  a  little  of  both. 

Now  we  are  getting  ready  for  Thanksgiving,  and  the 
woods  and  hills  stand  so  still  and  look  so  knowing  these 
gray  days,  I  fancy  they  understand  it  all.  The  old 
houses  warm  up  slowly  for  the  beloved  festival,  like  the 
great  bake-ovens,  where  pies,  and  turkeys,  and  chicken 
pasties  all  go  in  together.  Did  it  ever  strike  you  that  the 
world  is  very  much  like  a  Thanksgiving  bake-oven  ?  We 
are  all  put  into  the  heat  and  stress  of  life,  but  the  prod- 


JAKE    SMALL  'S  PA  TRON.  433 

uct  is  not  as  calculable  as  are  the  viands  coming  out  of 
the  old  oven.  Some  come  out  overdone,  some  under 
done,  some  juicy  and  sweet,  some  all  dried  up  and  with 
out  substance,  some  with  such  a  nice  brown  crust  and 
light  as  a  feather,  others  heavy  as  lead  and  bad  for  the 
digestion.  Some  are  crisp,  others  are  very  tough.  Some 
get  just  the  right  burn  on  them,  but  nearly  all  are 
scorched  too  much  or  not  well  done  on  the  under-crust. 

The  mystic  pre-Thanksgiving  rites  consist  in  cleaning, 
and  brushing  a  great  deal.  Windows  must  be  washed, 
rugs  shaken,  carpets  swept  with  tea-leaves,  and  all  the 
table-service  new  burnished.  We  show  our  thankfulness 
by  trying  to  be  very  clean.  The  sons  and  daughters  and 
grandchildren  and  great-grandchildren  are  all  coming 
home.  We  seem  to  hear  their  voices  afar  off  down  the 
railroad  track  and  the  blue  hills  open  their  arms  to  take 
in  the  rovers,  the  world-weary  exiles  from  the  hearth 
stone,  and  the  flocks  of  little  children  who  make  the  air 
so  sweet  with  their  lispings.  It  is  an  autumn  freshet  of 
kindred  that  floods  the  village  and  leaves  a  high-water 
mark  of  good  feeling. 

Jake  Small  has  been  wondrously  important  and  busy 
of  late.  An  air  of  mystery  has  hung  round  him  amusing 
to  witness,  and  he  has  now  absolutely  no  time  to  attend 
to  Mrs.  Small  and  her  eight  children  in  the  way  of  kind 
lings,  firewood,  provisions,  and  the  general  comforts  of 
life.  Jake  believes  in  a  special  providence  whose  busi 
ness  it  is  to  take  care  of  his  family  and  preside  over  the 
domestic  hearth,  and  as  heaven  thus  far  has  been  kind  to 
him  in  the  shape  of  good  neighbors  who  would  think  it  a 
scandal  to  let  any  one,  however  worthless,  seriously  suffer 
within  the  town  limits,  he  finds  himself  quite  at  ease  to 
attend  to  other  people's  affairs. 

Jake  has  a  patron  to  whom  he  is  wholly  subservient. 
This  is  Joe  Elmore,  Margaret's  brother,  now  in  his  sec 
ond  year  at  college,  and  very  high  in  his  secret  fraternity. 


434  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

Jake  taught  Joe  all  he  knew  when  a  boy  about  woodcraft, 
fishing  and  gunning,  and  has  always  held  him  in  the 
greatest  respect  and  affection,  because  Joe  puts  him  down 
in  his  place  and  assumes  the  mastery  over  him  with  a 
perfectly  unscrupulous  hand.  He  is  as  fond  of  Joe 
Elmore  as  he  is  of  his  ridiculous  gore  of  land,  and  will 
follow  him  about  like  a  whipped  dog  that  loves  the  hand 
that  beats  it.  In  his  high  Sophomoric  dignity  Joe  felt  it 
was  absolutely  necessary  to  look  up  some  nice  girl  upon 
whom  he  could  fix  his  affections,  some  charmer  to  dream 
about  and  scribble  bad  verses  to,  while  he  kept  her  pho 
tograph  stuck  in  his  looking-glass  and  was  joked  about 
her  by  his  chum.  It  would  be  delightful  to  correspond 
with  this  maiden  on  the  sly,  though  there  was  no  reason 
for  not  doing  so  openly.  Joe  had  looked  around  for  an 
eligible  girl  in  the  village  to  whom  he  could  devote  him 
self,  and  he  found  a  very  nice  one  in  the  person  of  Stella 
Withers,  the  eldest  daughter  of  that  Widow  Withers  who 
married  "  Brother,"  and  the  sister  of  the  twins.  When 
Joe  selected  his  girl,  much  as  he  might  have  chosen  the 
finest  pippin  on  an  apple  tree,  he  felt  himself  to  be  a  con 
noisseur  in  girls  ;  nothing  but  the  best  could  pass  muster 
with  him.  What  made  the  situation  deliciously  dramatic 
was  the  fact  that  he  had  a  rival,  and  must  guard  his  girl 
with  Argus-eyes. 

Joe  had  promised  his  sister  Margaret  and  his  aunt 
solemnly  not  to  go  to  wine-parties.  He  felt  it  a  grievance, 
for  if  there  was  any  thing  he  coveted  it  was  the  reputa 
tion  of  being  very  fast  while  he  retained  his  pristine 
innocence.  He  had  been  made  very  ill  by  smoking  a  few 
cigarettes  in  the  privacy  of  his  own  room,  so  that  he 
might  tell  the  fellows  that  he  did  smoke  sometimes.  He 
had  been  invited  to  drink  tea  twice  at  the  houses  of  a 
brace  of  old  professors,  and  had  been  petted  and  praised 
by  their  very  mature  sisters,  cousins,  and  aunts.  He  had 
a  glorious  time  among  those  old  ladies,  and  when  he 


THE   RIVALS.  435 

went  home  at  about  ten  at  night  he  fairly  danced  across 
the  campus,  hugging  himself  and  saying  inwardly : 
"Whew!  ain't  I  going  it,  though.  This  is  life."  He 
told  some  tremendous  "  whoppers  "  to  his  chum  as  to  the 
age  and  general  good  looks  of  the  faculty  ladies,  that 
he  might  be  envied  of  men.  Joe's  heart  was  so  pure  and 
innocent  that  the  smallest  lapse  from  the  college  dis 
cipline  made  him  feel  like  a  bandit  from  the  plains.  He 
meant  honestly  to  be  a  "dig,"  to  justify  all  the  sacrifices 
Margaret  and  Miss  Elmore  were  making  for  him.  He 
fully  expected  to  turn  out  a  very  brilliant  scholar,  to 
attain  a  high  position  in  life,  possibly  to  mount  to  the 
presidency  of  these  United  States.  But  just  now  Joe 
desired,  like  many  another  fine  young  fellow,  to  eat  his 
cake  and  have  it  too.  It  was  perfectly  comical  to  see 
him  assume  the  airs  of  a  finished  gentleman,  copying  the 
manners  of  the  president  of  his  college,  even  to  the  mode 
of  using  his  handkerchief,  and  then  lapse,  in  a  moment 
of  forgetfulness,  into  a  rather  slangy  college  boy.  He 
never  could  bear  the  strain  of  fine  manners  very  long, 
but  Margaret  particularly  enjoyed  their  assumption  in 
his  noblest  moods. 

Now  that  Joe  had  set  Jake  Small  Argus  to  watch  his 
lo  in  the  form  of  Stella  Withers,  he  felt  so  delightfully 
villainous  it  seemed  as  though  his  rakish  propensities 
must  be  seen  and  known  of  all  men.  This  beat  making 
mild  love  to  the  elderly  ladies  at  professorial  teas  all 
hollow.  Joe's  rival  was  an  old  friend  and  former  com 
rade,  whom  he  had  learned  to  distrust,  if  not  to  hate. 
He  was  no  other  than  Robert  Smartweed,  the  very  "  cute  " 
young  reporter  on  a  small  city  paper,  said  daily  being 
possessed  of  an  immense  stock  of  brass,  assurance,  and 
wicked  inventions. 

It  published  probably  the  worst-looking  cuts  of  public 
people  that  ever  were  devised.  The  very  badness  and 
impossibleness  of  these  cuts  helped  to  sell  the  paper ; 


43^  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

people  bought  it  to  see  how  far  the  pictorial  art  could 
sink  before  it  touched  bottom.  The  stock  of  pictures 
which  did  duty  on  all  occasions  got  shuffled  up  like  a 
pack  of  playing-cards,  and  the  editor  forgot  to  whom 
special  ones  belonged,  and  used  them  quite  at  random. 
A  saintly  philanthropist  or  great  divine  was  often  repre 
sented  by  some  noted  pugilist  or  murderer  of  extreme 
ferocity.  Bob  Smartweed  felt  very  proud  of  his  profes 
sion.  There  was  nothing  he  cared  to  do  but  furnish 
highly-spiced  matter  for  his  journal.  He  was  naturally 
of  a  chilly  nature,  and  the  cool  impudence  engendered 
in  him  by  his  favorite  vocation  had  congealed  and 
hardened  until  it  was  thought  by  his  landlady  hardly 
necessary  to  keep  a  refrigerator  in  her  basement,  even  in 
summer.  It  hardly  can  be  said  that  he  never  had  been 
young,  but  the  semblance  of  youth  he  once  may  have 
possessed  was  quite  lost  in  the  office  of  the  illustrated 
daily.  At  the  time  of  which  I  am  writing,  the  Sphinx  of 
Egypt  was  actually  frisky  compared  with  Bob.  Tadmor 
in  the  desert  would  seem  juvenile  beside  him,  and  as  for 
the  hills,  we  know  the  little  ones  sometimes  skip  like 
lambs  and  the  great  ones  like  rams,  so  it  would  be 
impossible  to  compare  this  nineteenth-century  youth 
even  to  them.  He  might  possibly  fraternize  with  "  chaos 
and  old  night,"  but  nothing  more  nearly  up  to  date.  The 
sarcastic  expression  and  look  of  universal  knowledge  that 
came  over  Bob  when  you  tried  to  tell  him  any  thing  was 
very  amusing.  He  made  every  body  feel  as  green  as 
grass,  even  his  Grandfather  Maydew,  who  lives  in  our 
village  ;  and  as  to  Grandma  Maydew,  she  had  a  kind  of 
shuddering  dread  and  delight  in  Bob,  such  as  Gretchen 
may  have  felt  when  she  first  encountered  Faust. 

"  I  feel  kind  of  scared  to  have  you  on  that  paper,"  she 
said  timidly  to  Bob,  who  was  at  home  for  the  autumn 
holidays,  looking  up  at  him  through  her  innocent  old 
glasses  while  paring  a  pan  of  rosy-cheeked  apples  for 


HE  A  D  LINES  DOUBL  E-L  OA  DED.  437 

Thanksgiving  pies.  "  You  know  all  them  murders,  and 
suicides,  and  divorces,  and  babies  smothered  by  whisky- 
drinking  mothers,  or  burned  to  crisp  on  red-hot  stoves. 
Oh,  it  is  dretful,"  and  she  vaguely  waved  her  hand  as  if 
she  had  seen  a  vision  of  these  noisome  things  like  a  flock 
of  carrion  birds  flying  in  at  the  windows  of  the  editor's 
sanctum.  "  Oh,  it  is  dretful  to  have  you  there,"  and  the 
nice  old  lady  heaved  a  deep,  tremulous  sigh.  "  What 
have  I  got  to  do  with  the  murders  and  suicides  ? " 
returned  Bob,  brushing  himself  off.  He  was  always 
brushing,  being  particularly  nice  about  his  person,  even 
to  the  tips  of  his  well-kept  finger-nails. 

Grandma  Maydew  opened  her  mouth  to  answer  his 
question  and  then  closed  it  again.  She  hated  to  betray 
her  ignorance  to  the  sneer  of  her  grandson  Bob,  but  she 
had  always  secretly  felt  that  he  was  some  way  implicated 
in  the  murders,  and  suicides,  and  other  atrocities,  and  it 
had  been  a  subject  of  secret  grief  to  her. 

"  I  will  tell  you  what,  grandma,"  Bob  resumed,  with 
condescending  gentleness,  "  you  must  not  be  frightened 
by  head-lines  double-leaded."  "  Head-lines  double- 
loaded,"  repeated  the  old  dame,  more  mystified  than  ever. 
Could  he  mean  dynamite  ?  She  meant  to  ask  Marthy 
when  she  came  home  that  evening.  Marthy  was  Bob's 
sister,  who  taught  school  in  the  village.  She  was  sharp 
too,  but  in  a  different  way  from  Bob,  and  she  would 
surely  know  what  head-lines  double-leaded  meant. 

"Well,"  she  resumed,  with  another  quivering  sigh, 
"  the  world  is  getting  away  from  me.  I  can't  pretend  to 
keep  track  of  things.  We  never  have  had  a  murder  here 
in  this  town,  though  we  have  had  'most  every  thing  else 
in  my  time,  and  I  do  hope  we  never  shall  have  one." 

"  It's  entirely  unnecessary  to  get  one  up  for  me  to  re 
port  in  our  paper,"  returned  Bob,  with  one  of  his  rare 
laughs  ;  "  and  mind  what  I  say,  granny,  don't  be  worried 
by  what  you  read.  It's  most  of  it " 


43  8  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

"  You  don't  mean  to  say  it's  all  a  pack  of  lies  ? " 

"  No,  not  quite  that ;  but  it's  cooked  up — doctored  to 
suit  the  public  palate — a  little  sage,  and  pepper,  and 
summer-savory,  such  as  you  put  in  your  turkey  stuffing, 
granny." 

"  Well,  mind  what  I  tell  you,  Robert,  it's  devil's  cook 
ing." 

Bob  took  his  hat  and  went  out  for  an  afternoon  stroll, 
and  his  course  lay  in  the  direction  of  the  big  sycamore 
tree  and  Stella  Withers's  home.  Jake  Small  had  been  on 
the  look-out  for  him,  and  had  written  to  Joe  Elmore,  who 
was  coming  home  for  his  vacation,  and,  indeed,  did  ar 
rive  the  next  evening,  a  cabalistic  note  which  ran  thus  : 
"  The  enemy  have  hove  in  sight.  He  is  kind  of  laying 
around  loose  just  at  present ;  but  I  think  he  will  put  in 
some  fine  work  before  long.  You  had  better  get  home 
immediate."  This  was  written  on  a  postal-card  without 
signature,  in  such  a  terrible  hand  it  actually  amounted  to 
a  secret  cipher,  for  it  could  only  be  made  out  by  the  one 
to  whom  it  was  sent. 

Jake  saw  Bob  Smartweed  go  into  the  house,  and  en 
sconcing  himself  in  the  shadow  of  the  big  tree,  he  watched 
and  listened.  Presently  a  tune  was  struck  up  on  the 
piano,  and  then  it  stopped,  and  then  it  began  again.  Bob 
was  making  a  long  call.  Jake  affectionately  felt  of  a 
thick  stick  he  carried,  and  almost  patted  it  in  his  desire 
to  exercise  it  on  Smartweed's  head.  After  a  while  Bob 
came  out  and  lingered  a  little  at  the  door,  with  the  rosy 
face  of  Miss  Stella  just  behind  him.  Jake  sauntered 
away,  but  not  so  far  that  he  did  not  hear  every  thing  that 
was  said  : 

"  So  you  think  you  can't  go  ?     I  am  very  sorry." 
"  I'm  engaged,"  lisped  Stella,  sweetly,  and  then  Bob 
gave  her  a  long,  searching  look,  and  turned  and  walked 
slowly  away.  Bob  had  been  asking  Stella  to  take  a  buggy- 
ride  on  Thanksgiving  afternoon.     Most  of  the  young  men 


STELLA    SNUBS  JAKE   SMALL.  439 

and  maidens  of  this  part  of  the  country  seem  to  think 
Sundays  and  holidays  were  mainly  invented  to  give  them 
an  opportunity  for  buggy-riding.  Joe  Elmore  had 
engaged  Stella  in  advance  for  this  particular  occasion, 
having  in  his  mind's  eye  his  Uncle  Hillman's  new  rig — a 
shining  buggy  and  excellent  fleet-footed  horse,  which  he 
had  already  arranged  to  borrow  in  order  to  cut  as  great 
a  dash  as  possible  in  town.  There  was  at  that  time  but 
one  rather  poor  livery-stable  in  the  village,  and  Joe  knew 
well  enough  that  Bob  Smartweed  could  procure  nothing 
better  than  an  old  slouch  of  a  horse  and  a  very  rusty  rat 
tletrap  of  a  conveyance. 

After  Bob  Smartweed  had  moved  off  from  the  door  of 
the  cottage,  Stella  lingered  a  little  on  the  porch  to  pick 
some  dead  leaves  from  a  few  potted  plants  which  stood 
there  under  cover.  She  was  humming  a  merry  little  air 
which  seemed  to  go  to  the  words,  "  I  will  not  be  a  re 
porter's  bride."  Jack  Small  crept  up  to  the  steps  and  put 
his  hand  to  his  ragged  cap,  and  said  in  a  loud  whisper  : 
"  If  Mr.  Joe  knew  as  him  was  snoopin'  round  here, 
miss,  he'd  give  him  a  knock  on  the  crown,  and  if  you  says 
the  word,  miss,  I'll  do  it  myself." 

Miss  Stella's  fancy  was  delightfully  titillated  by  the 
fact  that  she  had  two  adorers  that  were  at  daggers  drawn, 
and  might  come  to  blows  on  her  account,  but  she  snubbed 
Jake  Small,  as  he  deserved. 

"  Go  along,"  said  she,  quite  uppishly,  "  and  let  Mr.  Joe 
take  charge  of  his  own  affairs." 

"  So  I  will,  miss  ;  he's  a-coming  on  the  eight  train  to 
morrow  night,  and  him  will  look  arter  his  own  preserve 
in  his  own  way." 

Joe  arrived  duly,  so  full  of  self-content  and  delightful 
juvenility  the  village  seemed  to  grow  brighter  merely  by 
his  presence.  It  amused  his  sister  Margaret  not  a  little 
to  watch  Joe's  maneuvers  and  subterfuges  in  getting 
away  to  see  his  girl.  The  excuses  he  made  for  his  sud- 


44°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

den  disappearances  and  long  absences  were  sometimes  of 
the  thinnest.  He  tried  to  meet  Bob  Smartweed  and  give 
him  a  little  touch  of  swagger  and  defiance,  but  for 
a  day  or  two  without  success.  On  the  afternoon  of 
Thanksgiving  Day  Joe  got  his  Uncle  Hillman's  horse  and 
buggy,  as  I  have  said,  per  contract,  and  drove  round  by 
a  back  way  to  Stella's  house.  He  had  never  felt  so  de 
lightfully  rakish  in  his  life  as  on  this  occasion  when 
taking  out  his  chosen  girl  with  another  man's  horse,  which 
he  did  not  intend  by  any  means  to  spare.  If  the  beast 
just  escaped  laming  and  foundering,  it  was  all  that  could 
be  expected,  considering  the  occasion.  Joe  handed  his 
girl  in  with  a  flourish,  and  the  young  couple  bowled  down 
the  pike  and  along  the  Roundabout  Road  in  the  highest 
glee.  Stella  wore  a  particularly  becoming  fall  hat,  and  her 
cheeks  glowed  like  red  roses.  As  they  neared  the  glen 
where  the  smoke  from  charcoal  pits  was  ascending  through 
the  naked  trees  and  the  still  air,  they  saw  before  them 
another  buggy  pursuing  the  same  road.  Joe  knew  it  was 
one  of  Haines's  horses,  and  he  guessed  who  was  in  the 
vehicle.  By  speeding  his  very  willing  nag,  much  to  the 
delight  of  Stella,  who  was  high-spirited  and  courageous, 
he  managed  to  come  up  abreast  of  the  other  buggy,  and 
get  a  peep  at  the  occupants.  The  driver  was,  of  course, 
Bob  Smartweed,  and  the  girl  beside  him  proved  to  be  no 
other  than  our  old  acquaintance,  Freddie  Haven,  the 
most  popular  girl  in  the  village,  who,  since  the  marriage 
of  Ned  Buckner  to  Sylvia  Macy,  had  been  quite  subdued, 
but  was  now  again  taking  to  the  society  of  boys  and 
youths  of  Bob's  age  with  fresh  avidity.  Seeing  that  his 
old  friend  Joe  intended  to  get  past  and  give  him  his  dust 
on  the  road,  Smartweed  applied  the  lash  to  the  back  of 
his  lean  nag  with  such  vigor  that  he  gave  a  great  lurch 
forward,  and  fairly  got  away  from  the  Hillman  horse  to 
the  distance  of  some  rods. 

"  Don't  she  look  old  and  wrinkled  ? "  asked  the  bloom- 


THE   ACCIDENT.  44* 

ing  Stella,  after  Bob's  spurt  on  the  road  had  carried  them 
beyond  ear-shot.  "  I  should  think  she  would  be  ashamed 
to  fix  herself  up  as  she  does." 

Joseph  was  too  much  excited  to  answer  Stella.  He 
was  bound  to  run  by  Smartweed  if  it  cost  his  Uncle  Hill- 
man  his  best  horse.  So  he  laid  on  the  lash,  and  amid  a 
clatter  of  wheels  and  a  great  cloud  of  dust  the  nag 
bounded  forward,  while  Stella  emitted  a  series  of  shrill 
little  shrieks  indicative  of  her  excitement  and  delight. 
Bob's  hired  horse  had  not  much  staying  power,  and  as 
it  turned  out  the  livery  buggy  had  less.  Joe,  with  his 
powerful  horse,  soon  came  alongside,  and  the  two  young 
men  glared  at  each  other  horribly.  Again  Bob  bent  for 
ward  and  laid  on  the  lash  with  all  his  might.  The  poor 
rackabones  gave  a  high  desperate  leap  ;  something 
cracked  about  the  forward  wheels,  and  in  a  moment  the 
buggy-box  had  half  slipped  from  the  running  gear,  a 
wheel  was  off,  and  Miss  Freddie  was  sitting  in  the  soft 
part  of  the  road  quite  unscratched,  and  Bob,  equally  un 
harmed,  had  fallen  his  full  length  on  the  turf  by  the  side 
of  the  way. 

It  cost  Smartweed  half  a  month's  salary  to  repair  the 
damage  of  that  deadly  encounter.  The  story  got  abroad 
in  the  village,  and  there  was  a  great  roar  of  laughter. 
Uncle  Hillman  enjoyed  the  little  tale  and  pardoned  Joe 
for  bringing  his  horse  back  quite  wind-blown  and  knocked 
up.  Joe  \vas  more  bumptious  than  ever.  He  felt  that 
he  had  achieved  something  in  the  fast,  reckless,  dissi 
pated  line  worthy  the  hero  of  a  penny  dreadful.  Smart- 
weed  had  been  discomfited,  and  poor  Freddie  had  been 
obliged  to  walk  back  four  miles  to  the  village.  But 
Bob  had  vengeance  in  his  eye.  He  intended  to  do  a 
stroke  of  business  before  leaving  the  village.  So  after  a 
day  or  two  he  arrayed  himself  in  his  smoothest,  most  oily 
fashion,  and  called  on  John  Dean.  He  was  received  in 
that  great  man's  snuggery,  where  cigars  were  handed, 


44 2  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

and  the  two,  with  chairs  drawn  up  before  the  open  fire, 
fell  into  easy,  unrestrained  chat  without  the  least  sug 
gestion  of  note-book  or  pencil. 

"  Of  course  you  won't  publish  any  thing  I  say  here  in 
my  own  house  where  you  are  received  as  a  guest,"  re 
marked  Dean,  who  was  perfectly  delighted  to  have  a 
chance  to  unburden  his  mind  to  a  reporter  ;  "  you  will 
consider  my  remarks  strictly  confidential." 

"  Strictly,"  returned  Bob  with  mild  assurance.  "  We 
have  a  theory  in  our  office  that  men  are  never  interviewed 
unless  they  wish  to  be  ;  and  I  know,  Mr.  Dean,  you  don't 
care  to  appear  in  print." 

"  Exactly,"  !said  Dean,  exulting  in  his  heart  at  the 
thought  that  reporters  are  all  egregious  liars,  and  the 
more  they  say  they  won't  interview  the  more  they  mean 
to.  Consequently,  in  the  blissful  hope  of  seeing  his 
opinions  reported  in  full  under  a  vile  cut,  he  opened  the 
whole  of  his  mind  to  Smartweed,  kept  his  finger  rotating 
by  the  half-hour  together,  and  made  even  that  hardened 
young  man  gasp  for  breath.  But  Dean's  cigars  were 
very  good,  and  when  Bob  did  escape  into  the  open  air  he 
indemnified  himself  by  taking  a  number  of  them.  1  may 
say  here  that  John  Dean  subscribed  at  once  for  six 
months  to  the  illustrated  daily,  and  scanned  its  columns 
every  morning  to  find  the  interview  rehashed  and  dressed 
up  in  the  best  sensational  style.  But  he  never  did  find 
it,  and  no  man  was  more  disgusted  with  that  rascally 
reporter,  who  for  once  had  told  the  truth. 

Bob  stepped  across  the  street  to  the  house  of  Judge 
Magnus,  and  was  received  with  much  kindness  by  the 
judge  himself,  who  happened  to  be  in  a  genial  mood. 
"  I  am  afraid  of  you  fellows,"  the  judge  remarked. 
"  Among  you  I  feel  as  if  I  must  protect  my  secrets  much 
as  one  guards  one's  pocket-book  in  a  crowd  of  pick 
pockets,  Your  paper  has  lied  about  me  up  hill  and 


WAILING  AND  GNASHING  OF  TEETH.          443 

down.  You  have  misconstrued  my  motives  and  de 
famed  my  acts." 

"All  great  men  are  lied  about,"  returned  Bob  solemnly. 
"  That  is  the  penalty  you  pay  for  greatness.  Lies  do  a 
man  like  you  no  harm,  Judge  Magnus.  You  are  too  well 
braced  in  the  affection,  the  esteem — what  shall  I  say  ? — 
the  reverence  of  the  people." 

The  judge  smiled  at  the  young  fellow's  coolness,  but 
his  vanity  began  to  warm  up,  and  as  Bob  wormed  his  way 
into  the  judge's  mind,  all  his  political  secrets,  his  dam 
aging  opinions  of  his  friends  and  associates  trickled  out. 
Bob  protested  entirely  too  much  that  he  should  never 
betray  the  judge's  confidence,  and  thinking  it  over  later 
the  great  man  went  about  with  an  uneasy,  half-nauseated 
feeling  in  his  mind,  until,  behold,  one  day  there  appeared 
in  the  illustrated  daily  the  whole  interview,  doctored, 
dressed  up,  spiced  with  malignity,  and  peppered  with 
misconstruction,  and  at  the  head  of  it  stood  one  of 
those  dreadful  grinning  cuts,  labeled  with  the  name  of 
the  illustrious  Judge  Magnus. 

I  must  draw  the  curtain.  There  was  wailing  and 
gnashing  of  teeth  and  tearing  of  hair;  and  the  judge 
believes  this  interview  has  cost  him  the  nomination  for 
governor  of  the  state. 


CHAPTER  XLV. 

A    BUNDLE    OF     LOVE-LETTERS. 

I^HE  young  man  named  Hugh  has  reached  a  turning- 
point  in  his  destiny  ;  he  is  going  to  be  married. 
These  last  days  and  weeks  of  the  year  he  has  been  tramp 
ing  about  in  wind  and  snow-flurries,  rain  and  sunshine, 
taking  a  mute  farewell  of  the  places  where  he  has  so 
long  practiced  his  druidical  worship  of  nature,  finding  a 
kind  of  compensation  for  all  his  failures  in  the  sense  of 
a  beautifully  ordered  universe — solid  beneath  his  feet, 
sound  in  all  its  parts,  governed  by  immutable  laws,  in 
themselves  highest  and  noblest  harmonies. 

His  joy  during  the  years  he  has  lived  in  our  village  has 
been  in  finding  himself  free — his  own  master.  If  he  is 
proud  at  all,  it  is  because  he  has  never  been  bought  and 
sold  for  money,  reputation,  or  any  poor  or  trifling 
ambition.  If  he  has  not  added  much  to  the  bulk  of  the 
world's  good,  he  has  made  his  little  protest  against  the 
ruling  passions  of  men.  He  has  injured  no  man,  robbed 
no  fellow-being,  combined  to  harm  no  widow  or  orphan 
through  legal  means.  He  has  broken  no  trust,  never  has 
he  fled  to  Canada  to  escape  punishment  for  embezzling 
other  people's  funds,  never  has  he  depleted  a  church 
treasury  or  watered  the  stock  of  a  railroad,  or  made  a 
corner  in  grain  to  raise  the  price  of  bread  in  poor  men's 
mouths.  He  has  simply  lived  his  own  life,  held  to  his 
own  inward  convictions,  laughed  at  his  neighbor's  weak 
points,  not  unkindly,  and  cultivated  his  natural  instincts. 

While  most  of  his  college  classmates  have  grown  old, 
turned  gray,  or  worn  their  hair  off  in  the  pursuit  of 
money  or  position,  he  has  retained  every  spear  of  his 


THE  FINGER   OF  FA  TE.  445 

hair,  with  his  good,  natural  color,  his  bright  eyes,  and 
handsome  teeth,  and  all  the  youthful  spirits  with  which 
he  was  endowed.  Hugh  has  done  this  by  keeping  up 
that  nexus  between  himself  and  nature  which  belonged  to 
him  at  birth,  and  taking  hold  of  simple  enjoyments  with 
fresh  idealism.  Yes,  Hugh  is  a  bit  of  a  genius,  but  it  lies 
as  much  in  his  heart  as  in  his  head.  He  knows  how  to 
love  the  world  unselfishly  without  rendering  himself 
miserable  if  he  can  not  possess  a  large  share  of  its  dirt 
and  stones.  His  ideal  ownership  is  immense.  No  one 
has  ever  lived  in  this  part  of  the  country  who  has  so 
thoroughly  possessed  himself  of  the  streams,  woods,  hills, 
the  river,  the  mountains,  every  thing  that  lies  under  the 
sky. 

Though  village  life  is  very  narrowing  to  many  minds, 
it  has  not  injured  Hugh.  He  has  known  how  to  skim 
the  cream  of  existence  where  most  folk  let  it  mold  on 
the  pan.  So  he  might  have  gone  on  for  years  without 
really  fossilizing  or  becoming  as  crotchety  as  old  Speng- 

ler,  as  tedious  as  Rastus  B ,  or  as  much  of  a  piece  of 

bank  mechanism  as  Allibone.  But  the  finger  of  fate 
seemed  to  point  pretty  conclusively  to  the  fact  that  Hugh 
needed  a  new  and  enlarged  sphere  of  life  or  his  natural 
development  would  be  arrested.  He  had  pushed  indi 
vidualism  to  an  extreme.  The  time  had  come  to  take  up 
the  burdens  of  humanity,  and  live  for  others.  At  that 
moment  Oriana  came,  as  I  have  told  you,  into  the  nar 
rowed  slit  of  the  pupil  of  his  eye,  was  photographed 
upon  the  retina,  and  thence  by  some  mysterious  process 
transmitted  to  his  heart. 

Hugh  has  not  enjoyed  the  uninterrupted  rapture  of 
love's  young  dream.  He  has  been  walking  all  over  the 
country  in  extreme  agitation  of  mind.  Now  that  he  is 
committed  to  something  else,  owing  to  the  perversity  of 
his  nature  the  old  life  seems  to  lie  placid  and  serene 
behind  him  as  if  lapped  in  the  valley  of  the  Lord,  and 


446  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

the  new  looks  often  vexed,  doubtful,  and  uncertain.  Yet 
do  not  for  a  moment  suppose  that  he  is  not  deeply  in 
love  with  Oriana.  He  has  tried  to  get  tuned  up  by  the 
company  of  bare  trees — great  oaks  with  the  stiff  leaves 
rattling  on  their  branches,  or  pines  making  music  with 
their  fingers  on  the  air  strings,  or  cedars,  hemlocks,  and 
spruces,  all  so  hearty,  so  unvexed  by  notions  and  crotch 
ets  and  self-torments  as  they  lift  themselves  after  the 
summer's  decay  into  the  cold  crystal  air  with  a  great 
sense  of  rejoicing  at  the  core.  The  dead  leaves  upon 
the  moss  have  spoken  to  him,  and  the  brave  strong  limbs 
that  in  an  access  of  new  life  have  pushed  them  off  to 
secure  enlarged  conditions  of  growth.  He  has  tramped 
to  all  the  hill-tops  and  looked  at  the  clean-cut  blue 
mountains  whose  faces  he  knows  so  well,  now  like  hard 
gems  graved  with  a  sharp-edged  tool.  He  has  found  his 
way  to  Cedar  Glen  Hollow  and  the  little  red  school- 
house,  but  the  school-money  ran  short  this  year  before 
the  customary  three-months'  term  ended,  and  the  school 
is  not  in  session.  The  scholars  are  dispersed,  and  the 
red-haired,  nasal-voiced  teacher  has  not  yet  begun  her 
rule. 

As  the  door  was  unlocked,  Hugh  entered  and  gazed 
about  at  the  empty,  cold  little  place,  with  its  hacked 
benches  and  scribbled  walls,  the  box-stove  turned  red 
and  rusty,  the  ceiling  fallen  in  patches,  and  the  black 
board  with  its  sums  still  remaining.  Hugh  peeped  into 
Tim  Long's  desk  in  the  hope  of  finding  a  stray  compo 
sition  left  there  by  chance,  but  it  was  devoid  of  all 
interest,  though  half  filled  with  a  litter  of  school-boy 
rubbish.  He  sat  down  on  one  of  the  low  benches  as  if 
he  too  had  come  there  to  be  a  learner  in  the  school  of 
life,  and  because  of  his  shortsightedness,  disobedience, 
and  folly  could  only  gain  admittance  to  the  primary 
grade.  For  almost  the  first  time  in  his  life  he  felt 
the  need  of  perfect  humility  and  some  extraneous  aid 


REVIEWING  HIS  COURTSHIP,  447 

to  help  put  away  pride  and  inward  resistance.  Though 
he  was  very  much  in  love  with  a  charming  young  lady, 
and  but  partially  aware  of  the  cause  of  his  qualms 
and  reactionary  fits,  it  was  probably  owing  to  the  gipsy 
vein  in  him  that  Hugh  did  hesitate  to  give  up  his  manly 
independence  to  take  upon  him  the  yoke  of  matrimony, 
and  settle  down  into  the  rather  tame,  subdued  barn-yard 
fowl,  which  to  his  vision  symbolized  the  average  domes 
tic  man. 

Now  that  he  sat  in  the  cold  little  school-house,  of  all 
places  best  suited  to  his  mood,  he  began  to  think  over 
his  courtship  with  Oriana,  and  its  various  ludicrous  and 
tragic  phases — its  storms  and  calms,  and  wind-gusts,  and 
thunder-claps  and  flashes  of  lightning,  followed  by  sweet 
weather  and  inland  quiet.  It  had  probably  been  differ 
ent  from  any  other  courtship  on  record,  and  necessarily 
so,  considering  the  very  positive  and  strongly  marked 
characteristics  of  the  two  people  engaged  therein.  I 
fancy  that  real  courtships  are  generally  very  different 
from  the  novelists'  conception.  They  are  more  prosaic 
and  commonplace,  or  more  original.  Each  one  is  a  little 
drama  quite  by  itself,  so  that  your  own  experience,  if  you 
have  had  one,  does  not  let  you  into  that  water-tight  com 
partment  where  other  lovers  sit  as  secure  as  if  they  alone 
inhabited  the  planet. 

Hugh's  love-making  had  been  difficult — not  so  much 
from  any  inherent  stumbling-blocks  in  Oriana's  nature 
as  from  the  need  they  both  felt  of  being  absolutely  gen 
erous  and  self-forgetful  to  the  point  of  making  each 
other  miserable  for  life.  Hugh  had  scruples  about  living 
on  Oriana's  fortune.  Oriana  had  scruples  about  impos 
ing  a  fetter  on  Hugh's  free  spirit.  She  feared  he  would 
regret  the  step  if  once  he  should  take  it.  He  feared 
she  might  covertly  despise  him  in  the  end  for  his  want 
of  positive  success  in  life.  So  they  stumbled  about  in 
the  dark,  getting  into  deep  bogs  of  misconception,  and 


448  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

then  floundering  out  the  best  they  could.  But  after  every 
misunderstanding,  which  caused  them  both  nameless 
tortures,  they  felt  that  they  were  dearer  to  each  other, 
more  necessary  to  each  other  than  ever — that  life 
would  not  be  worth  the  living  unless  they  could  spend 
it  together. 

Hugh  sat  in  the  cold  school-house  that  November  day, 
done  up  in  his  great-coat,  with  the  clouds  skurrying 
across  the  hills,  and  thought  it  all  over.  A  grim  kind  of 
facetiousness  suffused  his  mind  as  he  realized  how  two 
intelligent,  enlightened  people  not  in  the  first  flush  of 
youth  could  ingeniously  contrive  to  torment  each  other, 
while  at  the  same  time  their  whole  prospect  of  earthly 
happiness  lay  in  sharing  a  common  life  united  in  the  ten- 
derest  and  most  enduring  bonds.  The  folly,  nay,  insanity, 
of  the  whole  proceeding  presented  itself  to  him,  and  he 
tried  to  probe  his  own  mind  and  find  out  whether  he 
were  the  guilty  one.  Surely  Oriana  was  not  to  blame. 
With  all  her  moral  whimsicality  and  superfine  notions 
Oriana  was  always  noble,  a  creature  of  such  infinite 
charm,  such  capacity  for  happiness  and  making  others 
happy,  he  could  only  compare  her  to  the  earth  and  sky 
he  loved  so  well,  to  nature  in  all  its  varying  and  delightful 
phases.  Hugh  felt  positively  ill  when  he  recalled  the 
pain  he  had  given  this  woman.  He  took  out  all  her  let 
ters  and  telegrams  from  a  little  letter-case  he  carried  in 
his  pocket  and  spread  them  out  on  Tim  Long's  desk,  in 
order  to  study  them  for  a  few  hours  and  try  and  make  up 
his  mind  as  to  where  the  blame  lay.  I  shall  take  the 
privilege  of  looking  over  his  shoulder  to  copy  some 
paragraphs  from  this  singular  correspondence.  In 
order  to  make  the  thing  complete,  it  is  necessary  to 
glean  a  part  from  Hugh's  own  memory  of  his  wicked 
little  notes. 

She — "  We  can  not  live  together,  and  we  can  not  live 
without  each  other  ;  what  are  we  going  to  do  !     You 


"/    WILL    TAKE  NOTHING  BACK."  449 

never  gave  me  any  thing  but  the  little  black  arrow-head, 
and  I  will  send  that  by  return  mail,  with  all  your  letters 
and  telegrams." 

He  (telegram) — "  Wait — I  am  coming  by  the  next 
train." 

After  three  days,  having  thought  better  of  the  journey  : 
"You  know  your  taunt  is  most  ungenerous.  I  have 
given  you  all  I  have  that  is  of  any  value,  and  you  scorn 
it.  I  will  take  nothing  back  from  you.  I  will  shed  my 
heart's  blood  before  I  take  any  thing  back." 

She — "  I  knew  you  would  not  come.  It  is  silly  to  talk 
about  shedding  your  heart's  blood.  We  are  not  acting 
in  a  cheap  play  at  a  dime  museum,  and  you  would  do  the 
Claude  Melnotte  business  very  badly.  I  do  not  believe 
we  shall  ever  understand  each  other.  I  am  high-strung 
and  passionate  ;  so  are  you,  with  a  great  many  old- 
bachelor  crotchets  thrown  in.  I  never  knew  so  set  a  man 
at  your  age.  We  had  better  repent  at  leisure  before  we 
marry  in  haste.  This  is  probably  the  last  time  I  shall 
tell  you  that  I  think  the  affair  had  better  be  considered 
off.  It  is  growing  actually  childish.  I  feel  myself  to  be 
getting  imbecile.  When  we  have  finally  settled  this  mat 
ter,  I  shall  try  to  return  to  a  state  of  calm,  but  I  fear  my 
life  will  have  been  hopelessly  spoiled." 

He — "  Oriana,  I  walked  about  in  the  woods  all  last 
night  trying  to  get  over  the  smart  of  your  terrible  unkind- 
ness.  You  are  the  cruelest  girl  in  the  world.  You  know 
I  love  you  with  entire,  absolute  devotion,  and  yet  you 
will  torture  me  like  a  child  sticking  pins  into  a  helpless 
fly.  When,  oh,  when  will  this  cease  ?  If  it  were  not  for 
the  last  words  of  your  heartless  letter,  I  should  wish  to 
shoot  myself." 

She  (telegram) — "You  had  better  not  walk  around 
in  the  woods  all  night,  you  will  get  malaria.  Are  you 
ill  ? " 

He—"  I  might  as  well  be  dead  as  to  be  in  the  condi- 


45°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

tion  I  am  in.  Will  you  marry  me  next  month,  as  you 
once  promised  ?  A  perfectly  plain  wedding  at  seven  in 
the  morning.  No  friends,  no  bride-cake,  no  nothing 
but  our  two  selves  and  the  parson.  Answer  by  return 
mail." 

She — "  I  do  not  remember  ever  making  such  an  absurd 
promise.  You  are  really  more  provoking  than  John  Dean. 
He  never  has  thrown  it  up  to  Elspeth  about  her  money. 
He  has  always  used  it  as  if  it  belonged  to  him.  Why 
can't  you  do  the  same  with  mine  ?  " 

He — "  I  appreciate  the  sarcasm  of  your  last  note,  and 
feel  it  to  be  decidedly  unhandsome.  Rather  than  be  looked 
upon  with  the  contempt  with  which  I  regard  J.  D.,  I 
would  hang  myself.  Could  you  not  give  your  money  to 
Mr.  Bergh  for  the  prevention  of  cruelty  to  animals  ? 
You  ought  to  as  a  return  for  all  you  have  inflicted  on 
one,  /'.  e.,  myself.  Then  we  might  go  out  in  the  world 
hand  in  hand,  like  the  Babes  in  the  Wood.  Telegraph 
me  how  this  idea  strikes  you.  I  could  get  myself  up  as 
an  Italian  padrone  ;  you  could  dance  and  sing  to  a  tam 
bourine.  Do  you  accept  my  terms  ?  " 

She — "  I  would  not  telegraph  an  answer  to  any  such 
nonsense.  What  would  the  operator  think  ?  You  know 
you  refuse  to  take  this  matter  seriously.  You  are  tri 
fling  with  me,  and  I  am  just  breaking  my  heart  for  noth 
ing.  Elspeth  suggests  by  letter  marked  private  that  I 
had  better  get  up  a  flirtation  with  somebody  else.  I  send 
you  this  proposal  of  Elspeth's  because  I  will  not  do 
anything  underhand.  What  do  you  think  of  it  ? " 

He — "  I  should  probably,  in  the  hypothetical  case  you 
state,  come  immediately  and  break  the  other  fellow's 
head.  I  am  half  inclined  to  think  you  make  the  sugges 
tion  in  order  to  throw  me  over.  Have  I  ever  done  any 
thing  so  despicable  as  to  throw  out  the  hint  that  I  could 
ever  think  of  another  woman  ?  Do  I  not  adore  the  very 
ground  you  tread  on  ?  Am  I  not  ready  to  devote  my 


A    GUSH  OF  SENTIMENT.  45* 

whole  life  to  your  happiness — every  thought,  feeling, 
impulse,  and  aspiration  ?  When  I  fancy  you  are  think 
ing  of  me,  it  makes  me  dizzy  with  joy." 

She — "  Rather  late  in  the  day  for  such  a  gush  of  senti 
ment.  One  would  think  you  had  not  yet  emerged  from 
jackets.  Please  do  not  send  me  any  more  letters  copied 
out  of  the  *  Perfect  Letter  Writer.'  I  know  you  dread 
to  give  up  your  bachelor  independence  and  roving  habits. 
You  think  I  will  turn  out  a  whimsical,  perverse,  peevish, 
neuralgic,  headachy  kind  of  woman,  who  will  make  a 
bond-slave  of  you.  and  deprive  you  of  all  liberty  of 
thought  and  impulse.  This  is  the  real  trouble  between 
us.  You  love  your  old  ways,  and  old  books,  and  old 
pipes  more  than  any  thing  else,  and  fear  you  may  regret 
the  change.  I  have  felt  this  to  be  true  all  along,  and  I 
release  you  without  submitting  you  to  the  humiliation  of 
asking  for  your  freedom.  Why  did  we  ever  meet  ?  Oh,  I 
am  a  very  unhappy  person." 

He — "  You  have  the  wickedest  nib  to  your  pen  any 
woman  ever  had,  and  every  time  you  use  it  you  draw 
blood.  If  you  were  poor,  it  would  be  very  different. 
You  would  not  then  feel  that  you  have  the  right  to  tutor 
me.  Our  natural  positions  are  reversed,  and  I  do  not 
see  how  we  are  ever  to  get  over  this  insuperable  obstacle. 
But  do  not  mind  what  I  say  now  ;  you  have  made  me 
angry.  Haven't  you  ever  a  kind -word  to  fling  to  me  ? 
You  might  telegraph." 

She — "  I  don't  send  love  missives  by  telegraph  or  on 
postal-cards.  You  have  now  begun  to  doubt  my — my 
feeling  for  you,  and  I  think  it  must  soon  end.  You  will 
keep  flinging  it  up  in  my  face  that  I  have  a  little  money. 
I  never  knew  any  thing  so  scandalous  in  all  the  days  of 
my  life.  If  I  were  a  perfect  termagant,  you  could  not 
talk  to  me  much  worse  than  you  do.  I  do  not  at  all 
know  what  I  am  made  of  to  stand  it.  Ah,  me,  I  am  very 
miserable.  How  terrible  it  would  be  if  we  should  find 


45 2  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

ourselves  tied  together  with  nothing  really  in  common 
but  a  mutual  disposition  to  squabble  and  bicker  !  If  you 
should  repent  the  step  you  had  taken,  I  think  I  should 
commit  suicide.  I  feel  so  snubbed  by  your  last  letter  I 
hardly  know  what  to  say  or  do.  I  am  sure  you  regret 
having  written  it  ;  but  you  would  do  the  same  thing  over 
again  next  week.  We  are  too  old  to  take  deliberately 
the  risk  of  life-long  misery,  and  I  think  we  had  better 
consider  this  correspondence  closed." 

Now,  as  Hugh  sat  in  the  cheerless  school-house  at 
Cedar  Glen,  with  the  letters  spread  out  before  him  on 
Tim  Long's  desk,  he  felt  an  emotion  of  intense  wonder 
and  astonishment  that  two  sensible  grown  people  should 
get  into  such  a  boggle  by  their  own  perversity  and  mis 
directed  nobleness  of  nature.  But  sitting  there,  with 
almost  the  whole  history  of  his  unique  love-affair  in  view, 
Hugh  saw  with  a  rush  of  repentant  feeling  that  he  had 
been  in  fault,  not  only  through  his  false  pride,  which 
haggled  about  the  bargain  in  taking  what  love  offered, 
but  also  by  a  certain  wild  and  nomadic  streak  in  his 
nature  that  made  it  hard  for  him  to  bow  and  worship 
the  domestic  ideal.  It  was  selfish  doubtless,  and  Oriana, 
with  her  subtle  woman's  instinct,  had  felt  it  all  out,  and 
had  doubted  with  perfect  propriety  the  wisdom  of  the 
step  they  thought  of  taking. 

It  all  came  upon  Hugh  as  a  new  discovery — his  pride 
and  tough-rooted  independence,  the  sense  of  resistance 
toward  yielding  to  an  absolute  self-surrender.  At  that 
moment  he  felt  that  he  loved  Oriana  for  the  first  time  as 
she  deserved  to  be  loved.  He  resolved  to  burn  his  ships 
for  her  sake  and  cut  loose  from  every  yearning  for  the 
old  life.  He  looked  about  for  the  stub  of  some  ancient 
pen,  an  ink-bottle,  and  the  stray  blank  leaf  of  an  old 
copy-book,  and  sitting  there  he  wrote  the  best  and  great 
est,  if  not  the  first,  love-letter  of  his  life.  I  shall  not  tell 
what  it  contained  further  than  to  say  that  it  might  be 


FAREWELL.  453 

expressed  in  Gen.  Grant's  immortal  words,  "  Immediate 
and  unconditional  surrender." 

And  now  they  are  going  to  be  married,  and  next  day 
sail  on  an  Italian  steamer  for  Naples.  Hugh  has  said 
farewell  to  all  his  favorite  haunts,  the  hills  and  fields, 
the  rocks  and  woods,  and  trout-brooks,  and  forest  walks, 
and  lonely  glens,  and  waterfalls,  but  he  has  slipped  away 
just  before  the  close  of  the  year  without  taking  a  formal 
leave  of  any  of  his  friends  in  the  village  except  Aunt 
Dido.  Poor  Aunt  Dido  is  heart-broken,  and  yet  so 
happy  to  have  Hugh  settled  in  life.  She  laughs  with 
one  eye  and  cries  with  the  other.  To  relieve  her  mind 
from  its  burden  of  grief  for  the  final  departure  of  her 
eccentric  but  charming  young  man  she  has  plunged  into 
communistic  literature  between  her  spells  of  cooking, 
and  now,  she  says  laughingly,  mixes  a  little  dynamite  with 
her  crullers  and  seed-cakes.  She  has  taken  up  the  works 
of  Mr.  Henry  George,  but  merely  as  a  means  of  distrac 
tion. 

"  'Tain't  Progress  and  Poverty,"  she  says,  that  she 
cares  about  so  much  ;  it's  only  to  relieve  the  destitution 
and  heart-ache  she  feels  for  the  loss  of  Hugh. 


CHAPTER  XLVI. 

LOOSE  ENDS  AND  DROPPED    STITCHES  OF  VILLAGE  LIFE. 

WITH  us  Thanksgiving  and  Christmas  seem  to  lean 
toward  each  other,  and  clasp  hands.  Like  right 
eousness  and  peace,  they  meet  together  and  kiss.  The 
sweetness  of  family  affections  has  been  hived  in  the  life 
cells,  and  with  the  pressure  of  this  good  time  the  comb 
yields  abundant  store  of  honey.  In  the  fall  and  winter 
holidays  every  body  comes  home,  and  there  is  a  little 
freshet  of  news  and  gossip.  Many  dropped  threads  of 
village  life  which  have  strayed  away  into  distant 
places  can  then  be  picked  up  and  woven  into  the  story 
without  an  end,  with  more  or  less  of  consistency  in  the 
web.  The  village  tingles  with  pleasant  expectations  of 
weddings  and  social  events. 

And  to  begin  with  the  news  :  Those  two  Busy  Bees,  the 
middle  one  and  the  youngest,  are  both  soon  to  be  married 
from  the  house  of  their  sister,  Mrs.  Worldly  Wiseman. 
The  middle  girl,  with  her  turn  for  aesthetics  and  decora 
tive  art,  has  taken  up  with  a  rich  oldish  man,  with  grown 
children,  who  are  furious  because  she  dares  to  intrude 
into  the  family,  and  refuse  to  come  to  the  wedding.  The 
youngest,  that  volatile  butterfly-girl,  will  bestow  her  hand 
on  a  young  drummer  who  knows  all  about  silks,  and 
laces,  and  Lyons  velvet,  and  goes  to  Paris  every  year  to 
buy  for  his  house.  So  it  would  seem  that  not  one  of 
these  Bee  marriages  is  ideal,  only  conventional  and  re 
spectable.  Not  one  of  the  Bees  I  fear  has  that  dainty 
little  cross  which  is  said  to  lie  at  the  base  of  the  forefinger 
in  the  palm  of  every  person  who  finds  his  or  her  true 
mate. 


A    DELICIOUS  LITTLE   SECRET.  455 

But  there  is  a  delicious  little  secret  which  I  must  con 
fess  has  given  me  a  great  deal  of  pleasure,  especially 
because  I  know  all  about  it,  and  it  has  not  yet  leaked  out 
and  got  abroad  in  town.  We  all  of  us  love  to  be  ensconced 
behind  the  scenes  while  the  rest  of  the  world  are  kept 
out  in  the  cold  ;  only  one  aches  so  to  tell,  that  the 
pleasure  is  somewhat  modified. 

I  sympathize  deeply  with  the  little  sisters,  Miss  Henri- 
ette  and  Miss  Sophie,  who  in  their  delight  and  exultation 
seem  to  be  more  one  soul  in  two  bodies  than  usual.  Their 
tiny  house  is  fairly  bursting  with  the  importance  of  what 
it  tries  to  hold.  The  cat  (I  firmly  believe  she  is  an  en 
chanted  princess)  sits  on  the  little  porch  and  ticks  her 
white  fur  with  a  knowing  look.  The  window-panes  seem 
to  wink  and  the  vines  to  wave  toward  me  as  I  go  past. 
Shall  I  let  out  the  secret  ?  I  must.  Miss  Crayshaw  has 
been  spending  a  few  weeks  in  our  neighborhood,  not 
just  in  the  village,  but  with  a  friend  some  miles  away, 
and  she  is  going  to  marry  Mr.  Allibone,  our  bank  cashier, 
that  poor  man  who  was  so  dreadfully  scathed  by  the 
charming  adventuress,.  Mrs.  Bridgenorth.  It  would  take 
too  long  to  tell  you  how  it  came  about.  They  were  thrown 
together  quite  accidentally  by  a  designing  friend  ;  and 
I  think  Miss  Crayshaw  felt  that  in  poor  Mr.  Allibone's 
fate  there  was  something  similar  to  her  own.  And  you 
know  sympathy  is  akin  to  love ;  only  one  little  step 
remains  to  be  taken. 

Though  both  are  quite  mature,  and  Miss  Crayshaw 
seems  a  little  affected  and  artificial,  I  should  not  at  all 
wonder  if  they  discovered  that  tiny  cross  at  the  base  of 
the  forefinger  upon  which  the  adepts  in  palmistry  lay 
such  stress.  The  little  sisters  are  going  to  have  a  wed 
ding  of  their  own.  All  their  predictions  have  come  true, 
and  who  can  help  being  a  partaker  in  their  pure,  unsel 
fish  joy,  although  they  idealize  Crayshaw  in  the  most 
ridiculous  way,  and  have  as  much  sentiment  about  her 
as  if  she  were  sweet  sixteen  instead  of  six-and-thirty  ? 


45 6  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

One  swallow  does  not  make  a  summer.  There  will 
still  remain  many  perpetual  widows  and  widowers  and 
old  maids  in  the  village.  The  constant  Spengler  still 
continues  to  shut  himself  up  and  hold  a  day  of  fasting 
and  prayer  when  one  of  his  friends  or  acquaintances  com 
mits  the  enormity  of  a  second  marriage.  There  are  spin 
sters  like  Marcella  Hildreth  and  Miss  Candace,  Melissa 
Tooler,  and  Marthy  Smartweed,  who  might  as  well  be  one 
hundred  and  fifty  as  on  the  bright  side  of  fifty  for  all  prac 
tical  purposes  of  matrimony.  There  are  widows  like  Sis- 
t'r  Ann  and  Aunt  Mariar  who  have  been  too  severely 
scorched  in  the  ordeal  to  think  of  marrying  again  if  they 
could,  which  is  out  of  all  question.  There  are  others,  like 
the  Widow  Holcomb  and  young  Mrs. Holt  who  are  too  com 
fortable  to  think  much  of  taking  another  mate,  having  a 
good  nest  already  built  and  stocked  with  means  sufficient 
to  keep  it  in  perfect  repair. 

As  for  my  delightful  friend  Milly  Grant,  the  milliner, 
I  am  not  so  certain  about  her.  She  is  still  on  the  Round 
about  Road  of  life,  and  must  remain  there  until  I  can 
take  her  up  at  a  point  further  on.  I  could  wish  that  some 
man,  wise  and  good,  and  sensible  enough  to  win  her  love, 
might  get  a  peep  at  her  through  the  keyhole  of  her 
bright  little  shop,  and  learn  how  shrewd  and  clever, 
sympathetic,  and  even  noble,  she  is. 

But  if  this  never  happens,  Milly  will  do  well.  She  will 
have  her  Spinoza  and  her  Plato  from  which  to  draw  an 
ideal  philosophy  and  maxims  for  the  higher  life.  She 
will  still  love  folks,  and  laugh  at  their  oddities  and  foi 
bles  with  a  kindly  heart.  She  will  still  idolize  the  mem 
ory  of  a  bad  father,  being  of  that  feminine  mold  that 
must  idolize  something,  and  will  go  weekly,  summer  and 
winter,  to  put  flowers  on  his  grave.  She  will  still  take 
that  precious  MS.  volume  of  her  father's  poems  from  the 
case  and  read  some  favorite  verses  to  her  intimate  friends, 
saying  thoughtfully,  "  When  I  am  rich  enough,  these 


MRS.   POINDEXTER' S  LETTER.  457 

shall  be  published."  It  Is  something  to  live  for.  As  to 
Margaret  Elmore  and  many  another  nice  girl  in  our  vil 
lage,  their  story  lies  warm  and  rosy  in  the  bosom  of  the 
future.  Next  year,  perhaps,  shall  be  Pentecostal  and 
bring  them  the  perfect  blessing  for  which  their  pure 
young  hearts  are  waiting. 

Salmon  A.  Poindexter  is  still  with  his  family  at  his 
country-seat,  the  Cedars.  He  has  written  to  his  sister 
Crissie,  who  is  now  abroad,  that  if  she  will  come  home, 
he  will  build  a  new  wing  to  the  villa,  with  apartments  for 
her  use,  which  she  can  shut  off  when  she  wishes  to  be 
alone.  He  will  give  her  a  pony-carriage  for  her  exclusive 
pleasure,  and  as  they  now  have  an  excellent  housekeeper, 
there  is  no  need  of  her  taking  charge.  She  can  live  and 
do  as  she  pleases,  only  he  wants  her  back  again  because 
she  is  necessary  to  his  comfort.  But  Mrs.  Poindexter 
has  also  written.  She  is  perfectly  delighted  Crissie  is 
having  a  happy  time  abroad.  Crissie's  last  letter  con 
tained  an  account  of  how  she  had  learned  to  drink  beer 
and  eat  black  bread,  and  was  very  amusing,  especially 
her  account  of  the  way  she  danced  at  the  Hofrath's  ball 
with  a  great  red-bearded  colonel  in  sword  and  spurs. 
Mrs.  Poindexter  has  ju-st  nursed  Beatrice  through  the 
measles.  She  has  been  getting  acquainted  this  year  with 
the  minds  and  hearts  of  her  children,  and  although  they 
miss  Aunt  Crissie  so  much,  still  she  desires  her  to  remain 
abroad  until  she  is  quite  satisfied,  and  has  taken  her  fill 
of  sights  and  impressions.  As  an  inducement  for  Cris 
to  go  to  Italy  this  winter  she  has  forwarded  a  handsome 
sum,  quite  unbeknown  to  Salmon  A.,  who  thinks  she  has 
spent  the  whole  amount  on  two  evening  dresses. 

Just  now  I  saw  Marcella  Hildreth  pass  the  window 
with  her  uncle  Jones  Davis,  a  tall  soldierly-looking  man, 
erect  as  a  young  ash,  with  long  silky  white  hair  waving 
about  his  head,  and  an  active  black  eye  as  quick  to  see  a 
pretty  girlish  face  as  it  ever  was.  Davis  had  always 


45 8  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

been  the  strong,  loving  friend  of  his  brother-in-law,  our 
heavenly-minded  deacon,  known  among  the  children  as 
the  town  clock,  albeit  a  very  different  type  of  man,  a  man 
of  the  world,  fond  of  jovial  companions,  good  suppers, 
and  all  the  pleasures  of  life,  and  though  not  a  scoffer  at 
sacred  things,  by  no  means  a  religionist.  Still  he  loved 
the  steady-going  deacon,  and  for  many  years,  until  the 
war  broke  out,  was  accustomed  to  drive  over  with  his  wife 
on  Thanksgiving  Day  from  the  county  town  where  he 
lived  to  break  bread  with  the  Hildreths. 

But  the  war  came  and  thrust  its  sharp  sword  into 
many  a  united  family  circle,  and  Jones  Davis  was  known 
as  a  copperhead  of  a  very  rank  and  offensive  kind.  The 
deacon,  on  the  other  hand,  felt  his  heart  burning  for  the 
Union  cause,  and  gave  his  money  to  equip  regiments, 
and  sent  his  son  to  die,  burned  up,  they  say,  in  the  Battle 
of  the  Wilderness,  a  year  after  his  first  colonel,  Ralph 
Freeman,  fell  mortally  wounded  on  the  field.  For  some 
time  after  Sumter  was  fired  on  there  was  little  or  no 
communication  between  the  Davis  and  Hildreth  families, 
but  when  Thanksgiving  Day  came,  because  old  habits 
are  strong,  and  his  wife  urged  him  to  try  and  heal  the 
breach  silently  made,  Jones  Davis  drove  over  as  usual  to 
the  village  with  his  wife  and  daughters.  As  the  horses 
drew  up  before  the  deacon's  door  he  came  out  bare 
headed,  and  before  any  one  knew  what  he  meant  to  do, 
he,  without  saying  a  word,  took  them  by  the  bits  and 
turned  the  carriage  round  squarely  in  the  road  until  the 
horses'  heads  pointed  down  the  old  pike.  There  were 
tears  in  his  eyes  and  his  lips  were  tremulous,  but  his  hand 
was  as  firm  as  iron. 

"Jones,"  said  he,  in  a  husky,  broken  voice,  "don't 
come  here  until  the  war  is  over,  and  if  it  goes  against  the 
Union  don't  ever  come,"  and  then  he  stood  and  pointed 
down  the  pike  like  a  mystic  figure  of  fate,  and  Jones 
with  his  head  dropped  on  his  breast  drove  slowly  away. 


"  WE    WILL   DRIVE   OVER    TO  JONES'S"         459 

The  families  did  not  meet  again  for  four  years.  The 
Davis  girls  grew  to  young  womanhood,  and  the  deacon 
yearned  to  see  them,  for  he  had  been  very  fond  of  them  as 
children.  As  the  war  had  ended  in  a  way  to  make  him 
happy  in  spite  of  the  memory  of  his  dead  boy,  whose 
body  he  had  sought  for  on  the  field  of  battle,  but  never 
found,  the  deacon's  heart  was  suffused  with  a  great  ten 
der  glow  of  gratitude.  He  could  even  find  some  grain 
of  tolerance  for  his  copperhead  friends  and  neighbors, 
remembering  that  God  tolerates  them,  and  that  the  rain 
falls  and  the  sun  shines  on  the  just  and  the  unjust. 

The  day  before  Thanksgiving  he  said  to  his  wife  : 
"  Mother,  we  will  drive  over  to  Jones's  to-morrow,  and 
I  will  tell  you  what  we  will  do.  We  will  sit  in  the  wagon 
before  his  door,  and  wait  like  Lazarus  before  the  rich 
man's  gate  for  some  of  them  to  come  and  speak  to  us  and 
bid  us  enter,  and  if  Jones  harbors  hard  feeling,  still  at 
any  rate  we  shall  have  shown  him  that  we  are  ready  to 
meet  him  more  than  half-way." 

So  they  did  accordingly,  and  after  drawing  up  before 
Davis's  door,  and  sitting  there  expectantly  for  some 
minutes,  the  door  opened  and  the  youngest  Davis  girl, 
a  bright  and  pleasing  picture  of  young  maidenhood, 
flew  down  the  steps,  and,  with  ready  wit,  unhitched  the 
traces,  and  led  the  horse  away  into  the  stable.  Then  she 
ran  back,  and  giving  her  hand  to  her  aunt,  said,  "  Uncle, 
if  you  and  aunt  will  walk  right  in  and  make  believe  there 
never  has  been  any  war,  father  will  be  perfectly  de 
lighted."  So  they  did  ;  and  now  Jones  Davis  is  an  old 
man,  and  perhaps  his  memory  is  failing,  but  he  tries  to 
make  out  that  he  was  the  strongest  kind  of  an  abolitionist. 

I  ought  to  mention  that  St.  Patty's  sons,  those  stalwart 
Western  men,  came  home  this  year  to  eat  of  the  sacred 
turkey  under  the  family  roof-tree,  and  there  was  a  great 
gathering  of  kindred.  It  was  charming  to  see  the  de 
light  those  big  boys  took  in  petting  their  old  mother  and 


460  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS, 

making  her  happy.  For  the  first  time  they  met  the  Rev. 
Arthur  Meeker,  Brasilia's  husband,  and  I  suspect  they 
tried  very  maliciously  to  give  him  the  moral  support  he 
needed,  partially  at  least,  to  throw  off  the  domestic  yoke. 
That  big  western  ex-governor  has  been  convulsed  with 
inward  laughter  during  his  entire  visit  by  the  state  of 
subjection  to  his  wife's  will  in  which  he  found  poor 
Meeker.  It  has  leaked  out  in  the  village  that  under  his 
protection  Arthur  has  been  caught  smoking  a  mild  cigar. 
He  was  at  once  summoned  before  the  bureau  of  domestic 
correction,  but  we  hope — we  almost  pray — he  was  not  ut 
terly  subdued  in  the  inquisitorial  chamber.  Some  peo 
ple  say  he  has  actually  refused  to  live  any  longer  on 
messes  and  Graham  food.  It  is  even  confidently  pre 
dicted  that  within  a  year  he  may  swear  at  his  wife  and 
demand  a  latch-key.  But  as  he  is  a  clergyman,  trained 
up  to  meekness  and  long  suffering,  this  is  of  course  a  pro 
fane  joke  invented  by  the  old  enemy. 

I  have  peeped  into  some  of  the  humble  homes  of  the 
village  to  get  a  glimpse  of  their  Thanksgiving  cheer. 
The  wish  of  the  good  French  king  is  realized.  Every 
laborer  has  a  fowl,  not  in  his  pot,  but  in  his  oven  ;  even 
the  poor-house  people  have  been  abundantly  feasted. 
Mrs.  Judge  Magnus  sent  the  Small  family  what  Jake 
called  "  the  handsome  compliment  of  a  generous  dinner." 
Tim  McCoy  has  taken  a  new  wife,  an  excellent,  clean, 
strong  woman,  and  a  good  cook,  who  will  see  that  the 
"  childers"  are  cared  for  like  her  own.  The  hearth  is  bright 
this  year,  and  the  humble  larder  well  stocked.  Tim  does 
not  mind  if  his  son-in-law,  Wilkins,  gives  him  the  windy 
side  of  the  street.  The  postmistress  is  always  true  to  her 
poor  relations,  nor  does  she  forget  the  lowly  nest  where 
she  was  born.  As  for  our  one  colored  family,  Mandy 
and  Sambo  Brown  and  the  "  pickaninnies,"  you  should  see 
them  around  the  board  with  the  "  tukke  "  as  center-piece 
and  common  object  of  fetish  worship.  How  the  teeth 


.A    GREAT  NOVELIST.  461 

gleam,  and  the  whites  of  the  eyes  roll  up,  and  the  tight 
little  wool  takes  a  new  kink  at  this  happy  time,  when 
Mandy  abates  the  rigor  of  her  rule  and  allows  the  chil 
dren  to  make  as  much  noise  and  litter  as  they  please. 

Between  Thanksgiving  and  Christmas  there  is  a  great 
deal  of  coming  and  going.  Mrs.  Magnus  warms  up  her 
large  house  hospitably  for  some  weeks  before  she  with 
draws  to  Washington,  and  Aunt  Dido  is  busy  cooking 
and  planning  for  her  entertainments.  This  year  we  were 
all  in  a  state  of  quivering  expectancy  over  the  advent  of 
a  great  novelist  who  was  coming  to  pay  a  visit  of  some 
days  to  the  Magnus  mansion.  The  village  felt  itself  hon 
ored  in  advance  by  the  rumor  of  his  approach.  From 
time  to  time  in  the  past  there  had  been  no  lack  of  dis 
tinguished  visitors  among  us,  but  this  celebrity  was  of  a 
more  exhilarating  and  exciting  kind  than  any  we  had 
heretofore  seen.  We  had  read  his  books  with  avidity, 
and  there  had  always  been  a  little  scramble  as  to  who 
should  draw  them  earliest  from  the  library,  and  thus  get 
the  first  cut  of  the  new  loaf.  We  had  enjoyed  his  char 
acters  and  scenes,  and  talked  them  over  together  to  see 
if  they  "jibed  "  with  our  own  experience  in  life.  Some 
of  us  felt  that  he  would  understand  our  secret  aspirations, 
and  that  we  should  be  conscious  of  a  kind  of  flow  of 
sweet  sympathy  from  his  soul  into  ours. 

Our  literary  young  lady,  who  writes  poetry  for  the 
local  papers  and  occasionally  gets  a  little  piece  inserted  in 
a  religious  journal  in  one  of  the  large  cities  (I  think  the 
Religious  Cfiromvhas  printed  two  of  her  pieces),  had  such 
dreams  over  the  advent  of  the  great  genius  that  she 
actually  believed  he  would  volunteer  to  offer  her  thin 
manuscript  volume  which  she  calls  "  Soul  Thrills  and 
Heart  Hunger,"  to  his  own  publisher.  She  had  always 
been  hidden  away  in  a  corner,  unappreciated  and  un 
prized,  but  if  he  deigned  to  smile  upon  her,  Fame  might 
yet  breathe  her  name  through  his  trumpet.  Thus  she 


42  VILLAGE   PHOTOGRAPHS. 

dreamed  early  in  the  morning,  half  awake,  while  all  the 
sparrows  in  the  vines  around  her  window  seemed  to 
twitter  the  name  of  the  great  novelist.  If  he  could  have 
imagined  one-half  the  silly  fancies  and  foolish  expecta 
tions  of  his  lady  admirers  in  the  village,  he  would  have 
been  a  great  man  indeed. 

Mrs.  Magnus  had  sent  out  invitations  for  an  evening 
reception  to  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Fancy  Penholder.  The  place 
was  in  a  flutter  from  end  to  end.  We  all  endeavored  to 
furbish  up  our  best  bib  and  tucker,  and  also  to  invent 
some  suitable  conversation  wherewith  to  approach  the 
lion.  We  primed  ourselves  with  beautiful  things  we 
would  say  to  him,  delicate  compliments  we  meant  to  pay, 
and  lay  awake  nights  getting  our  little  speeches  by  heart. 
There  was  a  singular  previousness  about  this  proceeding 
which  did  not  strike  the  village  mind  as  at  all  funny,  but 
then  we  did  not  confess  to  each  other.  Secretly,  we  all 
meant  to  be  so  very  clever  and  bright  that  he  would  see 
at  a  glance  we  are  not  clodhoppers,  but  thoroughly  in 
structed  people,  quite  abreast  of  every  thing  in  literature 
and  art,  and,  of  course,  not  too  much  overawed  by  the 
presence  of  any  celebrity,  however  portentous.  And  yet 
we  all  secretly  knew  we  were  ready  to  get  down  on  our 
knees  and  worship  if  he  proved  in  the  least  worthy  of 
adoration. 

Mrs.  Magnus  had  illuminated  the  grounds  and  the 
Doric  porch  of  her  house  with  Chinese  lanterns,  and 
it  was  very  interesting  to  watch  the  people  as  they  poured 
in  at  the  hospitable  door.  Poor  Freddie  Haven  had  not 
been  invited,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  the  social  prejudice 
against  her  being  just  now  very  extreme.  She  therefore 
sat  by  her  window  in  the  dark,  and  watched  all  who 
went  in,  as  one  can  fancy,  with  a  perturbed  and  aching 
heart.  There  was  Deacon  Hildreth  in  his  black  stock 
and  well-brushed  clothes,  his  wisp  of  hair  combed  high 
up  on  his  head,  and  with  his  comfortable  stout  wife  on 
his  arm  quite  confident  that  she  had  never  looked  so  well 


THE    VILLAGE  ASSEMBLES.  463 

in  her  life.  Behind  them  came  that  handsome  old  world 
ling,  Jones  Davis,  who  had  remained  over  for  the  occa 
sion,  with  his  niece  Marcella  on  his  arm,  looking  ex 
tremely  prim  in  her  new  black  silk.  There  was  Drusilla 
in  her  business  suit  convoying  the  Rev.  Arthur  as  if  he 
had  been  a  charity  scholar.  There  was  the  young  par 
son,  his  hair  "  tousled,"  his  neckcloth  a  little  on  one 
side,  all  agog  for  new  ideas,  while  his  pretty  wife  looked 
as  if  she  were  thankful  to  have  the  opportunity  of  wear 
ing  her  best  gown  and  laces  once  in  the  season.  There 
was  the  doctor,  with  his  saintly  wife  and  blooming  grand 
child,  and  Brother  George  in  evening  dress.  Miss  Can- 
dace  came  plain  as  a  Quaker,  and  without  gloves.  Mr. 
Worldly  Wiseman  looked  as  sleek  as  a  shiny  glass  bottle, 
and  his  handsome  wife  in  a  city-made  gown  was  a  little 
overdressed. 

The  Busy  Bees,  with  their  chosen  suitors,  made  quite 
a  flutter  of  high  fashion  as  they  entered.  The  literary 
young  lady  brought  the  MS.  of  "  Soul  Thrills "  in  a 
little  blue  bead  bag,  which  she  carried  on  her  arm.  She 
felt  almost  certain  he  would  ask  to  see  it.  "  Brother" 
and  his  wife,  she  that  was  the  Widow  Withers,  and 
rosy  little  Stella  glided  in  just  in  the  wake  of  Miss  El- 
more,  and  Margaret,  and  the  Sophomoric  Joe,  who  soon 
made  it  manifest  to  his  girl  that  this  adoration  of  genius 
was  all  bosh,  and  they  two  could  live  a  romance  that 
would  beat  any  thing  the  novelist  had  ever  written  all 
hollow.  The  little  sisters  came  in  their  best  frisettes 
and  false  fronts,  and  paid  their  respects  with  many 
courtesies  and  old-time  steps.  Miss  Crayshaw  came  too, 
trying  to  pretend  she  did  not  see  Mr.  Allibone,  whose 
head  shone  like  a  billiard  ball.  Old  Madam  Macy 
entered,  looking  like  a  duchess,  and  Mrs.  Ned  Buckner 
on  her  husband's  arm  seemed  very  happy  spite  of  the 
whispers  that  have  gone  round  that  she  is  much  to  be 
pitied. 

They  poured  in  and  flooded  the  large,  handsome,  light 


4^4  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

rooms,  all  eager  to  pay  homage  at  the  shrine.  He  stood 
upright,  expressionless,  by  the  side  of  his  hostess.  His 
supercilious  glance  ranged  coldly  over  the  crowd.  He 
was  tall  and  faultlessly  dressed,  and  when  he  spoke  it 
was  with  an  affected  stammer  which  he  had  cultivated  at 
some  pains  and  cost  to  himself.  He  bowed  just  so  many 
times  a  minute,  bending  his  body  at  exactly  the  same 
angle  each  time.  When  relieved  from  the  necessity  of 
bowing,  he  adjusted  his  eye-glasses,  and  looked  around 
with  a  perfectly  impersonal  glance  which  seemed  to  say, 
"  If  you  think  I  have  any  thing  to  give  away,  you  are 
mistaken.  My  ideas  are  all  engaged  at  so  much  a  line.'' 
After  a  few  moments,  however,  he  did  relapse  into  a 
fatigued,  world-worn  expression,  as  if  his  social  duties 
weighed  upon  him  like  lead. 

After  the  first  observations,  most  of  the  people  were 
struck  with  awe  and  crept  into  corners  and  conversed  in 
whispers.  When  the  doctor,  and  the  young  clergyman, 
and  a  few  others  approached  the  lion  in  the  hope  of  tick 
ling  him  into  a  mild  conversational  roar,  they  could  get 
nothing  out  of  him  except,  "  Oh,  ah  ;  I  fancy  you  are 
quite  right "  ;  or,  "  You  are  really  very  kind  to  say  so." 
But  Mrs.  Fancy  Penholder  proved  to  be  quite  another 
style  of  person.  She  was  somewhat  of  the  Skye-terrier 
order,  you  know,  great  eyes  and  a  picturesque  tangle  of 
hair  ;  but  she  dressed  to  a  charm  and  was  really  very 
pretty.  Her  frankness  in  talking  about  her  husband  was 
truly  original  and  engaging.  She  spoke  of  him  almost 
as  if  he  did  not  belong  to  her,  while  she  was  merely  part 
of  his  properties  for  getting  up  his  novels. 

"  I'm  less  literary  than  I  was  before  I  married  Mr. 
Penholder,"  she  said  with  naive  frankness  to  Mrs.  Worldly 
Wiseman.  "  I  find  being  literary  in  earnest  is  rather 
tiresome.  And  then  I  have  to  dress  up  to  each  of  my 
husband's  characters  as  they  form  themselves  in  his  mind. 
If  he  has  a  tragic  woman  on  the  carpet,  I  am  expected 
to  come  out  in  a  thunder-cloud  polonaise  with  streaks  of 


"ISN'T  SHE  A   LITTLE    TRUMP?"  465 

lightning  cut  bias,  or  I  must  wear  something  very  lurid 
and  fiery.  If  he  is  in  a  sentimental  Bopeep  novel,  then 
he  will  not  let  me  put  any  thing  on  but  sky-blue  muslin 
and  rosebuds.  You  can  have  no  idea  what  a  time  I  have 
trying  to  embody  all  his  conceptions.  I  have  almost  lost 
my  identity.  When  I  am  allowed  to  be  myself,  I  naturally 
seek  something  light  and  frivolous.  At  home  Mr.  Pen 
holder  refuses  to  let  me  wear  any  thing  that  does  not 
match  the  furniture,  and  when  I  am  buying  a  new  gown 
I  have  to  carry  the  wall  paper,  the  chairs,  sofas,  and  car 
pets,  even  the  picture-frames  in  my  eye.  Sometimes  I 
get  so  mixed  up  with  his  creations  I  am  nearly  wild. 
There  is  Lady  Claudia — I  detest  that  woman,  she  ran 
away  with  another  woman's  husband,  and  yet  for  a  time 
I  had  to  personate  her.  I  am  fast  coming  to  the  point 
where  I  shall  have  absolutely  no  character  of  my  own.  I 
shall  only  be  a  faint  echo  of  Mr,  Penholder's  novels." 

The  people  escaped  to  the  library,  the  hall,  and  the 
front  porch  to  laugh  over  Mrs.  Penholder  and  to  groan 
over  her  husband.  "  Are  you  not  dreadfully  disap 
pointed?"  "What  a  stupid  man!"  "  Do  you  think 
he  wrote  his  own  books  ? "  "  He  evidently  does  not 
mean  to  give  himself  away."  "How  conceited  he  looks!  " 
"  Perhaps  he  despises  us."  These  were  some  of  the 
whispered  comments  passed  around  from  one  to  another. 
There  was  one  poor  joke  from  Jones  Davis  :  "  He  may 
fancy  Penholder,  but  we  don't."  But  when  the  wife  was 
mentioned,  every  body  said,  "  Isn't  she  a  little  trump  ? " 
Our  literary  young  lady  kept  the  secret  of  the  blue  bead- 
bag  locked  in  her  own  breast.  She  never  thought  of  the 
silly  hopes  she  had  placed  on  the  great  genius  for  the 
publication  of  "Soul  Thrills  and  Heart  Hunger  "  without 
a  certain  sense  of  shame. 

We  have  all  come  to  the  conclusion  that  Penholder 
does  not  write  his  own  books,  but  we  firmly  believe  his 
bright,  animated  better-half  not  only  poses  for  them,  but 
composes  them. 


CHAPTER  XLVII. 

CHRISTMAS    IN    THE    VILLAGE. 

THE  first  real  snow-storm  of  the  season  came  in  loose 
large  flakes,  like  white  feathers  or  tufts  of  wool  cast 
down  from  the  shearing  of  the  heavenly  sheep.  It  has 
remained  with  us  for  the  Christmas  festival,  and  has 
brought  the  genuine  Christmas  cheer  and  jollity.  It  lies 
downy  and  pure  upon  the  fields,  and  gently  rounds  the 
valleys  and  clings  to  all  the  inequalities  of  the  hills.  Vir 
gin  purity  breathes  over  the  village  and  makes  it  to  shine 
like  the  palace  of  Baldur,  the  Norse  god  of  light,  which 
knew  no  grain  of  dust  or  touch  of  defilement.  The  roads 
lead  through  a  spotless  world,  softly  laced  and  printed 
with  the  shadows  of  naked  trees  and  the  delicate  blues 
and  violets  of  the  hills.  The  villagers  look  more  pictur 
esque  than  their  wont  in  fur  hoods  and  cloaks  ;  the 
cheeks  of  the  young  glow  lustily,  and  the  old  are  beauti 
fied  by  the  snow-frame  with  its  interfoliations  and  ara 
besques  ;  the  sleighs  are  out  with  tinkling  bells  ;  and  the 
sleds  are  out,  manned  by  boy  crews  ;  the  sunshine 
glides  into  old  rooms  through  speckless  windows,  and 
touches  old  faces  and  antique  furniture  with  a  new 
charm  of  expression.  Like  a  dove  the  snow  has  come 
and  perched  on  the  house-tops,  and  the  evergreeens  are 
burdened  with  tufted  white,  the  Christmas  roses  of  our 
northern  clime. 

In  these  last  sad  sweet  days  of  the  year,  when  the 
longest  story  without  an  end  must  needs  come  to  a  period 


THE  OTHER  SELF.  467 

for  the  time  being,  I  have  been  going  round  in  the  vil 
lage  like  an  old  Diogenes,  with  a  tallow  dip  in  my  hand, 
to  find  one  perfect  character.  There  is  the  doctor's 
wife,  there  is  Miss  Candace,  old  Deacon  Hildreth,  St. 
Patty,  and  a  dozen  others  who  are  often  spoken  of  as 
just  perfect — saints  upon  earth  ;  but  when  we  look  closely 
we  detect  little  flaws  and  specks  of  narrowness  and  old 
habits,  the  hardening  of  opinions  and  prejudices,  tag- 
ends  of  folly  and  vanity  and  human  weakness,  small 
lapses  from  the  highest  ideal,  such  as  mark  too  many 
repentant  crosses  in  our  own  life  experience. 

There  is  not  one  perfect,  no,  not  one.  But  going 
about  with  my  candle  in  the  still  twilight  of  the  old  year, 
when  the  trees  stand  so  gray  and  motionless,  I  see,  strange 
to  say,  a  shadowy  figure  stealing  along  beside  every 
human  being — that  other  self  so  strange  and  mysterious 
even  to  its  owner.  On  reflection  I  am  sure  Styles  Garth 
saw  that  other  self  in  his  shadow,  and  its  potentiality  of 
evil  may  have  frightened  him  when  he  caught  sight  of  it 
in  the  sunlight.  It  is  the  shadow-self  that  makes  every 
human  being  interesting  and  worthy  of  study.  The  vil 
lage,  quiet,  humdrum,  and  sleepy,  with  its  faded  old 
houses  and  steady  habits,  is  still  full  of  this  subtle,  mys 
terious,  creeping  life,  which  we  do  not  comprehend  and 
only  discover  by  flashes  of  true  insight.  The  quiet  air 
often  tingles  with  the  radiation  of  thought  and  feeling  as 
a  blue  column  quivers  over  the  glow  of  flame. 

You  may  have  remarked  that  my  village  has  increased 
strangely  in  size  for  so  small  and  unimportant  a  place. 
But  its  story  does  not  embrace  so  much  of  what  is  as 
what  has  been.  The  past  is  still  intact  with  us.  It  ac 
companies  the  village  as  an  aggregate  shadow  self,  a 
village  ghost  ;  often  to  be  seen  looking  white  and  wan 
like  the  pallid  moon  before  sunset.  It  takes  in  the  whole 
of  Burying-Ground  Hill  ;  for  the  dead  are  not  so  dead  as 
they  seem,  nor  are  the  living  so  much  alive.  The  dead 


468  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

walk  about  here  at  all  hours.  A  dead  hand  sticking  up 
out  of  a  grave  on  the  hill  often  points  the  finger  of  des 
tiny  to  the  new-born,  and  shapes  the  lives  of  creatures 
who  come  even  a  hundred  years  after  it  was  put  away  in 
earth.  Have  I  not  said  that  powerful,  sound-headed, 
large-hearted  Dr.  Abijah  Manners,  though  he  died  some 
half  century  ago,  seems  alive  and  active  to  the  children 
who  play  in  our  street  ?  Much  more  is  he  alive  to-day 
than  many  a  torpid  creature  maimed  and  deformed  by 
disobedience  to  the  laws  of  his  own  being,  and  broken  on 
the  wheel  of  life,  not  strictly  as  punishment,  but  because 
of  the  inevitableness  of  the  laws  of  the  universe. 

It  is  an  odd  thing,  but  only  yesterday  I  saw  "  Dr. 
Jekyll  and  Mr.  Hyde  "  walking  close  together  through 
the  village  street,  not  interchangeable,  but  existing  in  a 
semi-detached  state.  For  Hyde,  however  ugly  he  may 
be,  carries  Jekyll's  features,  and  Jekyll,  though  a  prosper 
ous,  handsome  man,  is  still  marked  by  Hyde  as  by  the 
small-pox,  nor  can  he  get  rid  of  him  while  wearing  his  own 
proper  form. 

I  have  a  curious  fancy  on  Christmas  Eve  I  have  never 
confessed  before.  It  comes  to  me  while  the  evergreen 
and  holly  are  going  up  in  the  church.  The  young  clergy 
man  likes  these  beautiful  old  heathenish  customs,  and 
encourages  the  boys  and  girls  to  make  the  church  look 
as  lovely  as  possible  in  its  verdant  garniture.  Many 
houses,  too,  are  wreathed  with  Christmas  green,  nota 
bly  the  doctor's.  For  days  before  the  blessed  eve, 
he  and  Effie  are  abroad  in  the  woods  gathering  ground- 
pine  and  lusty  branches  of  spruce  and  hemlock.  All  the 
pictures  look  out  of  leafy  setting,  and  the  hearth  is 
wreathed  with  boughs  and  red  berries. 

When  the  church  and  the  village  homes  begin  to  deck 
themselves  on  Christmas  Eve,  I  have  the  strange  fancy 
that  all  the  dead  come  home  to  keep  the  holiday — old 
and  young,  white-haired  people,  beautiful  maidens,  bands 


A    STRANGE  FANCY.  469 

of  little  children,  all  bearing  the  Christmas  rose  and 
palm.  In  they  glide,  with  no  pushing  or  crowding,  such 
as  happened  in  Mrs.  Oliphant's  "  Beleaguered  City,"  but 
they  make  the  place  only  the  more  homelike  to  those 
who  remain,  and  sweeten  the  air  as  if  they  had  poured 
upon  it  the  essence  of  violets. 

It  is  a  strange  fancy,  but  I  can  not  shake  it  off,  and  I 
steal  about  in  the  dusk  of  this  gracious  eve,  the  fairest  of 
all  the  year,  and  seem  to  see  the  departed  friends  troop 
in  over  worn  thresholds  of  old  homes.  They  carry  gifts 
in  their  hands,  and  as  they  go  in  they  all  turn  and  smile 
at  me,  sometimes  roguishly.  The  dear  children  look 
back  with  their  starry  eyes  through  floating  sunny  curls. 
I  wonder  if  the  mothers  whose  constant  hearts  still  ache 
for  their  little  ones,  no  matter  how  long  they  have  been 
what  we  call  dead,  do  not  feel  the  warm  kisses  and  the 
little  clinging  hands  while  tender  heads  nestle  upon  their 
bosoms.  Shall  I  tell  them  their  little  ones  have  all  come 
home  to-night  ?  Before  I  can  speak  or  move  the  vision 
vanishes — perhaps  it  was  only  a  dream. 

It  is  the  custom  of  our  good  doctor  to  celebrate  Christ 
mas  Eve  with  a  little  gathering  of  friends  and  neighbors 
about  the  holly-decked  hearth,  and  though  he  offers  but 
the  simplest  entertainment — nuts  and  apples  and  sweet 
cider — no  occasion  is  ever  awaited  with  more  impatience 
and  delight  by  the  few  who  are  privileged  to  come  to 
gether  there. 

The  doctor  has  a  peculiar  sentiment  connected 
with  this  eve.  He  feels  for  all  the  children  who 
are  so  restless  and  happy  in  their  little  beds,  dreaming  of 
Santa  Claus,  while  the  stockings  dangle  around  the  chim 
ney-piece.  It  is  a  holy  night,  sacred  to  childhood,  when, 
according  to  the  old  traditions,  witches  have  no  evil  power, 
only  good  elves  and  fairies  can  come  into  homes  with  the 
evergreens,  and  blessed  influences  rain  in  star  showers 
over  every  crib  and  cradle.  While  Drusilla  and  the  First 


47°  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

Church  ladies  give  out  fat  turkeys  to  all  who  are  too  poor 
to  buy  them,  the  doctor  sees  to  it  that  no  poor  child,  not 
even  a  little  Irisher,shall  go  without  some  gift  in  the  stock 
ing.  He  stole  away  the  other  day  to  the  nearest  large 
town,  not  even  taking  Effie  with  him,  as  he  coveted  the 
luxury  of  buying  cheap  toys  all  by  himself,  and  when  he 
came  back  his  wagon  was  full  of  mysterious,  odd-shaped 
parcels.  Not  one  of  Jake  Small's  bantlings,  nor  Sambo 
Brown's  pickanninies,  nor  Tim  McCoy's  children  were 
forgotten  ;  and  out  of  his  overcoat  pocket  protruded  an 
eye-winking,  real-hair  doll  for  Chippie,  cheek  by  jowl  with 
a  fine  dog-collar  for  her  dog,  Zip  Coon. 

This  Christmas  Eve  of  which  I  am  writing  has  been  a 
joyous  one  to  the  doctor,  for  his  brother  George  was  still 
with  him,  and  the  friends  who  came  were  taken  into  a 
warm  hospitable  embrace.  The  judge  and  Mrs.  Magnus 
are  now  in  Washington,  where  he  has  been  corresponding 
immensely  in  the  newspapers,  to  try  and  soften  down  and 
explain  away  the  interview  with  Bob  Smartweed.  As  this 
brings  him  so  much  before  the  public  the  judge  feels  with 
a  little  inward,  pious  self-justification  that  there  is  balm 
in  Gilead.  The  judge,  therefore,  could  not  beam  upon 
the  doctor's  little  party,  but  he  had  Milly,  and  Aunt  Dido, 
and  Miss  Candace,  and  John  Dean  and  his  wife,  and  the 
clergyman  and  his  pretty  mate,  and  Drusilla  and  the  Rev. 
Arthur  Meeker,  and  Deacon  and  Mrs.  Hildreth,  and  the 
Elmores,  and  others  of  our  friends  who  need  no  particu 
lar  mention. 

The  company  played  games  and  sang  old  songs 
at  times  to  Effie's  accompaniment  on  the  piano, 
and  again  they  gathered  about  the  hearth  and  told  old 
tales,  some  of  them  of  a  weird  and  ghostly  nature,  as 
seemed  to  befit  the  occasion.  I  know  the  doctor  spoke 
of  a  patient  of  his  who  once  lived  on  the  other  side  of 
Saddleback,  indeed  was  a  neighbor  to  the  man  Hayrick, 
who  came  to  such  an  awful  end  about  the  time  of  Presi- 


"MISS"   SAWYEX'S  GHOST.  471 

dent  Lincoln's  assassination.  This  old  man  Sawyer  was 
something  of  a  hermit,  and  entertained  peculiar  religious 
views.  The  old  man  had  been  unfortunate  with  his  chil 
dren,  most  of  whom  died  young,  and  the  only  boy  who 
grew  to  manhood  went  into  the  war  and  was  carried  off 
by  camp  fever  in  hospital.  In  a  few  years  Sawyer's  wife 
had  passed  away,  and  he  was  left  alone,  a  solitary,  slim 
old  body,  creeping  noiselessly  about  the  mountain  world 
where  he  lived.  His  religious  oddities  troubled  none  of 
the  few  and  widely-scattered  neighbors.  They  consisted 
in  certain  rites  and  ceremonies  peculiar  to  himself,  among 
others  the  placing  of  plates  and  chairs  at  the  table  for  all 
his  dead  family  on  Sundays,  Thanksgiving,  Christmas, 
and  at  the  New  Year  festival.  Silently  on  those  days  he 
seemed  to  sit  down  and  break  bread  with  the  departed  in 
a  strange  invisible  communion,  and  the  country  children 
spread  the  rumor  abroad  that  "  Miss  "  Sawyer  often  ap 
peared  at  a  certain  window  of  the  house,  looking  out  with 
wan,  shadowy  presence  at  the  place  where  she  had  been 
accustomed  to  sit  in  life  to  watch  the  "  passing,"  of  which 
there  was  but  the  least.  Old  Sawyer  is  dead  and  the 
place  has  new  occupants,  but  the  haunted  window  where 
"  Miss "  Sawyer's  ghost  used  to  sit  and  gaze  is  still 
pointed  out,  and  idlers  have  scratched  their  names  all 
over  the  glass. 

This  purely  local  tale  called  forth  from  George  Riv- 
ington  a  little  story  which  he  had  heard  from  an  ex-con 
federate  officer  in  the  south-west.  It  was  narrated  to  him 
at  a  large  hotel  in  St.  Louis  some  ten  years  after  the 
close  of  the  war.  After  the  capture  of  Lee's  army, 
twelve  officers  who  had  served  together  in  the  same  army- 
corps  in  the  confederate  ranks  formed  themselves  into  a 
little  club.  They  had  scattered  away  to  various  parts  of 
the  South  and  West,  but  they  agreed  to  meet  on  Christ 
mas  Eve  of  each  year  at  a  large  hostelry  in  one  of  our 
western  cities  for  a  late  supper.  Exactly  as  the  bell 


47 2  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

chimed  the  hour  of  midnight  they  were  to  rise,  and 
solemnly,  and  in  silence,  pledge  the  memory  of  their  dead 
comrades.  Moreover,  as  one  after  another  the  members 
of  the  club  were  taken  by  death,  the  covers  were  still  to 
be  laid  for  the  entire  twelve,  and  the  memory  of  these 
comrades  was  but  to  swell  the  aggregate  of  honor  and 
sorrow  paid  to  all  the  confederate  dead.  When  the 
agreement  was  first  made,  all  the  club  members  were 
comparatively  young,  strong,  vigorous  men.  But  in  a 
few  years  death  had  singularly  reduced  their  ranks,  and 
each  season,  as  the  survivors  met  around  the  board,  the 
occasion  became  more  melancholy  and  the  midnight  cer 
emonies  more  solemn  and  impressive.  Six  or  seven  years 
after  the  club  was  formed  there  were  but  five  surviving, 
and  they,  sitting  with  the  seven  empty  seats,  seemed  to  be 
attending  their  own  funerals.  Four  years  later  the  gen 
tleman  who  told  this  tale  to  George  Rivington  was  the 
sole  survivor  of  the  club. 

On  Christmas  Eve  he  repaired  to  the  place  of  meeting 
as  usual,  and  ordered  the  table  laid  for  twelve.  Alone 
he  seated  himself  in  full  uniform  at  the  head  of  the 
board,  and  strove  to  go  through  the  ceremony  of  din 
ing.  As  the  clock  struck  twelve,  the  waiter  having  left 
the  room,  he  slowly  rose  from  his  chair,  glass  in  hand, 
and  with  suffused  eyes,  drank  to  the  memory  of  the 
departed.  At  that  instant,  by  some  strange  illusion, 
every  place  was  filled.  He  saw  his  dead  friends  exactly 
as  in  life,  with  the  light  glancing  off  epaulet  and  sword- 
hilt,  each  holding  his  glass  as  he  rose  to  his  feet  to 
drink  the  solemn  pledge  to  the  confederate  dead. 
With  a  groan  he  sank  back  in  his  chair.  The  glass  was 
dashed  from  his  hand.  The  sound  of  his  fall  brought 
the  people  of  the  house,  who  found  him  insensible,  ap 
parently  in  a  fit.  They  put  him  to  bed  and  procured  a 
doctor,  and  it  was  long  before  his  confused  brain  could 
recall  the  exact  occurrences  of  that  night.  But  when  he 


AS   THE   CLOCK  CHIMED    TWELVE.  473 

regaired  strength  and  memory,  the  dread  of  the  next 
Christmas  Eve,  when  he  was  pledged  again  to  meet  his 
eleven  comrades,  affected  him  with  superstitious  terrors. 
However,  before  the  time  came  round  he  too  had  passed 
over  to  the  great  majority. 

When  Mr.  Rivington  had  finished  this  strange  little 
Christmas  tale,  it  was  drawing  on  toward  the  witching 
hour,  and  a  kind  of  awed  hush  fell  on  the  company,  as 
if  they  expected  to  see  a  ghostly  troop  enter  the  room. 
Erne  stole  to  the  piano  and  struck  some  notes  of  Auld 
Lang  Syne,  and  just  as  the  clock  chimed  twelve,  and 
Christmas  Day  was  born  the  whole  company  broke  into 
the  grand,  inspiring  old  song,  the  uncanny  feeling  was  at 
once  dispelled,  and  the  lamps  which  had  seemed  to  burn 
blue,  brightened  the  room. 

The  good  doctor,  knowing  Milly's  weakness,  asked  her 
before  they  parted  to  recite  one  of  her  father's  little 
poems.  Not  for  their  merit  did  Milly  choose  the  follow 
ing  simple  lines,  but  because  they  seemed  to  breathe  a 
spirit  of  hope  and  courage  toward  the  great  dim  unknown 
future  upon  whose  threshold  they  were  standing  : 

Brave  hearts  rejoice  to  meet  the  summer's  gold, 
Brave  hearts  still  gladden  in  the  winter's  cold, 
Blow  high,  or  low  the  winds  on  land  and  sea, 
They  bring  no  ill  to  me. 

The  sun  but  sinks  to  lead  the  new-born  day, 
Its  red  rose  blossoms  out  of  misty  gray. 
Blow  high,  or  low  the  winds  on  land  and  sea, 
They  bring  no  ill  to  me. 

In  youth,  dear  Nature  decks  the  sunny  brow, 
In  age,  she  wreathes  anew  the  frosty  pow. 
Blow  tempests  wild,  or  breathe  a  southern  gale, 
All  winds  shall  fill  my  sail. 

Good  wishes  and  merry  quips  had  flown  about  like 
little  birds  in  all  directions.  A  few  simple  gifts  were 


474  VILLAGE  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

exchanged,  and  then  the  guests  poured  forth  into  the 
cold  night  air,  where  the  winter  sky  sparkled  resplen- 
dently  with  ten  thousand  stars  over  the  snow,  and  a  trace 
of  sweetness  seemed  to  linger,  as  if  the  herald  angels, 
with  their  new  song  of  "  Peace  on  earth,  good  will  to 
men,"  had  just  passed  that  way.  And  because  a  child 
was  born  and  laid  in  a  manger — the  symbol  of  infancy's 
closeness  to  nature,  and  her  creative  powers — the  old 
earth  seemed  happier  than  her  wont. 
•  As  the  season  brings  its  pleasant  tokens  fraught  with 
love  and  kindness,  so  would  I  send  you  a  present,  though 
of  a  humble,  homely  sort ;  and  I  therefore  slip  into  the 
hamper  of  Santa  Glaus,  as  he  makes  his  midnight  rounds, 
a  bundle  of  Village  Photographs. 


THE    END. 


817 


U.C.BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


,'3817 


U.C.BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


